M9  COSH'S 

l\EpLyTo 
TYNDALL. 


■ 


,  J  flu  »<i%i«t|  «, 


PRINCETON,    N.    J. 


Shelf. 


BL    240    .M34    1875 
McCosh,    James,    1811-1894. 
Ideas   in  nature  overlooked 
by  Dr.    Tyndall 


Ideas    in   Nature 


OVERLOOKED  BY  DR.  TYNDALL., 


BEING   AN   EXAMINATION   OF 


DR.  TYNDALL'S   BELFAST   ADDRESS. 


Br 
JAMES   McCOSH,  D.D.,  LL.D.„ 

PRESIDENT   OF   PRINCETON   COLLEGE. 


>2«<C 


NEW     YORK: 
ROBERT    CARTER    AND    BROTHERS. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1875,  by 

ROBERT  CARTER  AND  BROTHERS, 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


Cambridge : 
Press  of  John  Wilson  and  Son. 


PREFATORY  NOTE. 


As  I  was  about  to  sail  from  Great  Britain  last  autumn,  on 
my  return  to  America,  I  procured  a  copy  of  Dr.  Tyndall's 
Belfast  Address,  I  read  it  on  the  deck  of  the  vessel ; 
allowed  the  yeast  to  ferment  in  my  mind  during  the  voy- 
age ;  and,  on  coming  home  to  Princeton  College,  I  deliv- 
ered my  thoughts  (not  written  out)  in  an  Introductory 
Lecture  to  the  Class  of  the  History  of  Philosophy.  Ab- 
stracts of  the  Lecture  were  forwarded  by  my  auditors  to  a 
few  literary  journals,  and  were  thence  copied  into  others  ; 
and  I  thought  it  advisable  to  write  out  fully  what  I  had 
uttered,  and  to  send  it,  as  I  was  requested,  to  a  periodical, 
so  deserving  of  encouragement,  the  "  International  Review,'' 
where  it  appeared  in  the  opening  number  of  Vol.  II. 

I  find  Dr.  Tyndall  is  sending  forth  edition  after  edition 
of  his  work  in  England  and  in  America ;  and  some  are 
anxious,  I  know,  to  have  by  them,  for  their  own  use  or  for 
circulation,  a  calm  reply,  free  from  all  personalities.  So 
I  have  consented  to  this  paper  appearing,  with  some  addi- 
tions, in  a  separate  form. 

Dr.  Tyndall's  Address  is  now  printed  with  two  Prefaces, 
in  which  he  professes  to  reply  to  his  critics.  The  original 
Address  is  clear  and  plausible  ;  but  the  Prefaces  seem  to 
me  to  be  exceedingly  weak,  loose,  and  unsatisfactory.  His 
critics  had  all  advanced  objections,  less  or  more  valid,  to 
his  atomic  theory  of  the  universe  ;  and  some  of  them  had 


IV  PREFATORY  NOTE. 

pointed  out  flaws  in  his  scholarship.  To  none  of  these 
does  he  condescend  to  offer  an  answer.  The  burden  of 
his  Prefaces  is,  '  See  how  ill-used  a  man  I  am  :  a  bishop 
has  been  raising  a  wail ;  the  Presbyterians  have  denounced 
me ;  and  the  Romish  hierarchy  are  ready  to  persecute  me.' 
He  must  not  be  allowed  to  forget  that  he  himself  began  the 
attack,  and  is  carrying  on  his  defence  in  quite  as  offen- 
sive a  manner  as  his  opponents ;  alleging,  charitably,  that 
"  the  common  religion,  professed  and  defended  by  these 
different  people,  is  merely  the  accidental  conduit  through 
which  they  pour  their  own  tempers,  lofty  or  low,  courteous 
or  vulgar,  mild  or  ferocious,  holy  or  unholy,  as  the  case 
may  be."  Those  who  criticise  him  are  charged  with  "  de- 
liberate unfairness,"  or  with  "  a  spirit  of  bitterness  which 
desires,  with  a  fervor  inexpressible  in  words,  my  eternal 
ill."  I  happen  to  know  of  some  of  them,  that  they  are 
praying  for  him,  in  all  humility  and  tenderness,  that  he  and 
all  others  who  have  come  under  his  influence  may  be  kept 
from  all  evil,  temporal  and  eternal. 

Dr.  Tyndall  thinks  that  much  good  may  be  done  in 
Ireland  by  the  spread  of  scientific  knowledge,  as  fitted  to 
lessen  the  bitterness  of  ecclesiastical  feuds.  I  agree  with 
him  here.  But,  unfortunately,  he  has  only  thrown  a  new 
element  of  trouble  into  the  boiling  caldron,  and,  I  fear, 
thrown  back  the  general  study  of  physics  in  Ireland.  I 
know  what  I  am  saying,  from  having  spent  sixteen  years  in 
that  country,  which,  as  an  accomplished  statesman,  at  that 
time  Lord-Lieutenant  of  Ireland,  once  remarked  to  me,  is 
less  inclined  towards  scepticism  than  either  of  the  other 
two  kingdoms,  —  I  am  inclined  to  add,  than  any  country 
in  the  world.  The  denominations  which  are  too  much  dis- 
posed to  war  with  each  other  have  all  combined  against  Dr. 
Tyndall,  —  no,  not  Dr.  Tyndall,  but  the  blank  theory  which 


PREFATORY  NOTE.  V 

he  has  expounded.  He  quotes  a  maxim  of  Bacon's, — 
taken,  I  may  remark,  from  Plutarch,  —  "  It  were  better  to 
have  no  opinion  of  God  at  all,  than  such  an  opinion  as 
is  unworthy  of  him  j  for  the  one  is  unbelief,  the  other  is 
contumely."  But  Bacon,  in  the  comprehensiveness  of  his 
mighty  mind,  has  a  counterpart  enunciation  :  "  I  had  rather 
believe  all  the  fables  in  the  Talmud  and  the  Alcoran,  than 
that  this  universal  frame  is  without  a  mind."  "  They  that 
deny  a  God  destroy  man's  nobility  :  for  certainly  man  is 
of  kin  to  the  beasts  by  his  body  ;  and,  if  he  be  not  of  kin 
to  God  by  his  spirit,  he  is  a  base  and  ignoble  creature." 

It  should  be  noticed  that  in  this  paper,  under  none  of 
its  forms,  have  I  charged  Professor  Tyndall  with  being  an 
atheist.  It  is  evident  that  his  convictions  or  feelings  have 
passed  through  various  phases,  and  are  at  present  very 
wavering  and  uncertain,  — feelings,  rather  than  convic- 
tions founded  on  evidence.  It  might  have  been  better  in 
these  circumstances  if  he  had  allowed  the  mud  to  settle, 
and  had  his  mind  clarified,  before  he  discussed  such  sub- 
jects as  he  has  clone  at  Belfast.  v£ut,  as  he  did  raise  all 
this  disturbance,  he  might  have  been  better  employed  in 
these  Prefaces  in  telling  us  what  he  does  believe  than 
in  complaining  that  he  has  been  misunderstood,  and  in 
speaking  contemptuously  of  men  who  know  what  they  be- 
lieve. In  this  paper  I  have  made  no  inquiry  into  his  per- 
sonal belief  (for  which  he  is  responsible  to  God,  and  not 
to  me)  ;  but  I  have  felt  myself  justified  in  looking  at  the 
statements  he  has  published,  and  at  the  consequences  to 
which  they  lead,  logically,  and  in  the  faith  of  those  who 
adopt  them. 

Princeton  College,  March,  1875. 


IDEAS    IN    NATURE. 


A  LL  throughout  his  Belfast  Address,  Professor 
■**•  Tyndall  defends  the  right  of  free  thought  in 
such  a  manner  and  spirit  as  to  leave  the  impression 
that  he  imagines  that  this  right  has  been  denied 
him  somewhere  or  by  somebody.  I  have  not  heard 
of  any  one  threatening  to  deprive  the  savant  of  his 
title  to  think  on  all  subjects  scientific  and  unsci- 
entific. But  there  are  not  a  few,  scientific  as  well  as 
unscientific,  who  doubt  whether  he  showed  delicacy  or 
even  propriety  of  feeling  in  opening  what  professes 
to  be  a  purely  scientific  society  with  such  a  specula- 
tive paper,  the  more  so  as  no  one  was  allowed  to 
reply  to  him  in  the  Association.  We  often  find  that 
those  who  use  liberty  of  speech  for  themselves,  are 
least  inclined  to  allow  a  corresponding  right  to  others. 
All  that  is  claimed  in  this  paper  is  the  privilege  which 
he  has  employed  so  freely.  I  feel  perfectly  entitled  to 
review  his  review  ;  and,  in  doing  so,  I  appeal  to  no 
other  tribunal  than  the  one  he  carries  us  to,  —  the 
laws  of  the  Court  of  Nature. 

Dr.  Tyndall  is  not  regarded  in  Great  Britain  as 
a  scientific  man  of  the  first  order :  he  is  not  one 
of  the  few  stars  of  the  first  magnitude.     I  am  not 


2  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

aware  of  any  discovery  made  by  him  which  has 
opened  a  new  department  of  nature,  or  set  scientific 
exploration  out  in  a  new  direction.  But  he  is  thor- 
oughly at  home  in  the  domain  of  Physics,  and  by  his 
researches  has  advanced  certain  departments  of  it. 
There  are  some  who,  on  the  principle  of  ne  sutof 
ultra  crepidam,  wish  that  he  would  keep  within  his 
own  magic  circle,  where  he  is  powerful,  and  not 
venture  out  of  it  into  the  wide  region  of  theosophy, 
where,  with  his  locks  shorn  by  a  Delilah  in  the  fas- 
cinating form  of  a  love  of  notoriety,  he  is  no  stronger 
than  other  men.  He  doubts  whether  the  great  New- 
ton, trained  in  mathematics  and  natural  philosophy, 
was  fitted  to  discuss  theological  subjects.  It  is  a  fact 
that  some  great  biblical  scholars  take  a  different  view, 
and  speak  of  Newton  as  quite  capable,  by  reason  of 
his  profound  penetration,  his  long  study  and  deep 
reverence,  to  dive  into  the  depth  of  divine  things. 
It  is  doubted  whether  Dr.  Tyndall  has  the  same  high 
qualifications  ;  and  those  who  feel  in  this  way,  regret 
to  find  him  indulging  in  the  construction  of  theories 
as  to  the  origin  of  things,  when  they  would  listen  to 
him  with  great  delight  dilating  on  heat  and  motion, 
on  glaciers  and  sounds,  —  and  this  when  they  may 
not  be  sure  that  he  has  come  off  any  higher  than 
second-best  in  his  controversy  with  Professor  Tait,  or 
that  he  has  given  the  right  explanation  of  the  curious 
phenomena  as  to  sound  which  he  has  lately  brought 
before  the  Royal  Society,  and  which  he  refers  to 
regions  of  the  air  impervious  to  sound.  He  is  ac- 
knowledged on  all  hands  to  be  a  brilliant  experimenter 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  3 

and  a  fascinating  expounder  ;  and  his  British  Associa- 
tion Address  is  the  clearest  enunciation  and  defence 
of  the  views  of  an  important  school,  —  constituting  a 
branch  of  a  mutual  admiration  society  —  who  are 
ever  quoting  each  other  as  infallible  authorities,  —  the 
other  members  being  Professor  Huxley,  Mr.  Herbert 
Spencer,  Mr.  Darwin,  and  Mr.  Bain,  and  a  whole  host 
of  inferior  men  who  have  assisted  the  leaders  in  get- 
ting the  British  Association  very  much  under  their 
management,  as  also  certain  portions  of  the  London 
press,  and,  it  may  be  added,  not  a  little  of  the  college 
patronage  of  the  late  liberal  administration  of  Eng- 
land. We  are  cherishing  the  hope  that  this  address, 
just  because  it  unfolds  so  openly  what  was  before  let 
out  only  in  hints  and  prognostications,  may  tend  to 
produce  a  reaction  in  Great  Britain  ;  as  men  now 
see  —  the  veil  having  been  lifted  from  their  eyes  — 
whither  they  are  being  led.  Within  the  last  two 
years  we  have  seen  what  a  collapse  took  place  when 
J.  S.  Mill's  autobiography  was  published,  and  all  men 
and  women  discovered  into  what  a  dark  cavern  his 
philosophy  conducted  them,  with  its  startling  results 
as  to  the  obligation  of  marriage  ties  and  the  allow- 
ableness  of  suicide,  with  its  avowed  want  of  assurance 
in  life  or  hope  in  death:  we  see  that  they  are 
"  without  hope  "  who  are  "  without  God."  It  is  pos- 
sible that  a  like  recoil  may  be  effected,  when  all  men 
are  made  to  know  that  our  world  consists  simply  of 
an  interaction  of  atoms  within  a  limited  sphere  of 
space  and  time,  encompassed  with  an  impenetrable 
region  of  darkness. 


4  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

Dr.  Tyndall  goes  back  two  thousand  two  hundred 
years,  and  quotes  a  succession  of  philosophers  favor- 
able to  the  atomic  theory  from  that  time  to  the  pres- 
ent. His  historical  sketch  is  adopted  at  second-hand, 
and  not  from  the  highest  authorities.*  Eminent  as 
he  is  as  a  scientist  (to  use  a  phrase  not  found  in 
Samuel  Johnson,  but  required  by  the  subdivision  of 
knowledge  in  our  day),  there  is  no  proof  that  he  has 
studied  philosophy,  or  that  he  is  specially  a  philos- 
opher :  he  is  certainly  not  a  rigid  reasoner,  and  he 
overleaps  wide  gaps  in  constructing  his  theories.  He 
quotes  lovingly  such  men  as  Democritus,  Epicurus, 
Lucretius,  Bruno,  Gassendi,  Hume,  and  Goethe ;  but 
has  taken  no  notice  of  the  views  of  others,  usually 

*  Blunders,  such  as  are  sure  to  be  committed  by  one  not  master 
of  the  subject,  and  trusting  to  secondary  authorities,  crop  out  ever 
and  anon.  Thus  he  talks  of  Empedocles  "  noticing  this  gap  in  the 
doctrine  of  Democritus  ; "  whereas  every  tyro  in  philosophy  knows 
that  Empedocles  comes  before  Democritus.  Speaking  of  the  cen- 
turies lying  between  Democritus  and  Lucretius,  he  makes  Pytha- 
goras then  perform  "his  experiments  on  the  harmonic  intervals,"  as 
if  Pythagoras  had  not  died  before  Democritus  was  born.  He  repre- 
sents Aristotle  as  preaching  induction  without  practising  it ;  whereas 
he  did  practise  induction  in  his  natural  history,  but  certainly  did  not 
preach  it  as  Bacon  afterwards  did.  He  ascribes,  it  could  be  shown, 
a  doctrine  to  Protagoras,  the  sophist,  which  no  scholar  would  attrib- 
ute to  him.  A  writer  (Thomas  Davidson),  in  the  October  number  of 
the  "Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy,"  proves  that  he  has  not 
given  a  thoroughly  correct  account  even  of  the  philosophy  of  his 
favorite  Democritus  ;  whom  he  represents  as  making  all  the  varie- 
ties of  things  depend  on  the  varieties  of  atoms  "  in  number,  size,  and 
aggregation,"  whereas  Aristotle,  the  only  original  authority  on  this 
subject,  says  that  he  made  them  depend  on  the  "figure,  aggregation, 
and  position."  In  the  same  article  it  is  shown  that  Dr.  Tyndall  mis- 
takes throughout  in  the  few  allusions  he  makes  to  Aristotle. 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  5 

reckoned  the  profoundest  thinkers  of  our  world,  — 
except,  indeed,  to  speak  of  the  oppression  laid  on 
thought  by  Plato  and  Aristotle.  I  mean  to  supply 
the  inexcusable  omission,  and  to  place  alongside  of 
the  atomic  theory  the  grand  truths  unfolded  by  the 
great  philosophers  of  ancient  and  modern  times  ;  and 
show  that  their  anticipations,  often  vague  and  mystical, 
have  been  made  certain  by  the  certain  methods  of 
modern  science.  When  these  overlooked  agencies 
are  mixed  up  with  the  atoms,  and  made  to  act  with 
them  and  counteract  them,  the  result  may  be  a  har- 
monious whole,  quite  consistent  with  religion,  natural 
and  revealed. 

It  is  a  well-known  historical  fact  that,  somewhere 
about  600  c.c,  there  was  a  remarkable  awakening, 
over  many  countries,  of  reflective,  as  distinguished 
from  spontaneous,  thought.  From  the  beginning, 
men  had  observed  the  works  of  nature,  — the  seasons, 
seeds,  plants,  animals,  and  the  diurnal  and  annual 
movements  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  and  turned  them 
to  practical  use.  But,  from  the  time  referred  to,  there 
were  penetrating  minds  that  were  not  satisfied  with 
practical  or  phenomenal  knowledge  ;  but  insisted  on 
going  beneath  the  surface,  and  inquiring  into  the 
nature  and  origin  of  things.  In  this  age  appeared 
Cakya  Muni',  the  founder  of  the  comparatively  pure 
but  inane  system  of  Boodhism  ;  Confucius,  the  great 
moralist  of  China  ;  and,  according  to  some,  Zoroaster, 
the  reformer  of  the  Magian  religion.  But  the  systems 
of  these  men  were  theosophic  or  ethical,  and  do  not 
throw  any  light  on  the  physical  phenomena  of  the 


6  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

universe  ;  and  so  we  turn  to  the  rise  of  the  Greek 
philosophy. 

Three  great  schools  appear  almost  simultaneously 
The  inquiry  of  each  is  what  is  the  cipx7l  or  principle 
of  all  things.  One,  the  Ionian,  whose  seat  was 
Miletus  or  Ephesus,  explained  nature  by  elements, 
commonly  by  some  favorite  element:  as  Thales,  by 
water  or  moisture  ;  Anaximenes,  by  air  or  ether ;  and 
Heraclitus,  an  offshoot  from  the  school,  by  fire.  We 
have  here  brought  before  us  the  deep  truth  which 
modern  chemistry  is  unfolding.  The  things  which 
we  see  are  compound,  and  if  we  would  understand 
them  we  must  trace  them  back  to  their  components. 
Another  school,  the  Pythagorean  or  Italic,  whose 
seat  was  Magna  Grecia,  could  not  be  satisfied  with 
these  ever-changing  elements,  and  discovered  higher 
and  more  permanent  principles  subordinating  them  in 
the  orderly  forms  which  things  are  made  to  assume, 
and  in  the  numerical  relations  running  through  them  ; 
so  that,  in  fact,  things  are  the  copies  of  numbers.  They 
delighted  to  trace,  often  in  a  mystic  way,  the  properties 
of  figures  and  of  numbers,  and  were  especially  the 
mathematical  school  of  Greece.  They  made  the  earth 
revolve  round  the  Hestia,  or  hearth  of  the  universe,  and 
thus  suggested  the  Copernican  theory  of  the  heavens. 
They  saw  a  universally  prevalent  order,  —  Pythagoras 
heard  the  music  of  the  spheres  ;  and  they  called  the 
heaven,  from  the  earth  upward,  Cosmos,  —  a  word 
which  has  been  fondly  retained  as  embodying  a  great 
truth.  About  the  same  time  arose  another  school,  the 
Eleatic,  which  affected  to  go  deeper  down  into  the 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  7 

nature  of  things,  and  by  pure  reason  found  beneath 
all  apparent  mutation  an  essential  Being,  which  has 
not  come  into  existence,  and  which  is  imperishable. 
The  poem  of  Parmenides  opens  with  an  allegory  of 
the  soul  longing  after  truth,  drawn  on  by  steeds  led 
by  virgins  along  a  road  untrodden  by  men,  on  the 
road  from  darkness  to  light,  and  brought  to  the  throne 
of  Dike,  who  reveals  the  unchangeable  heart  of  truth. 
In  this  we  have  an  anticipation  of  the  doctrine,  that 
the  sum  of  matter  and  force  cannot  be  increased  or 
diminished  by  creature  action,  but  remains  for  ever 
the  same,  thus  giving  a  stability  to  nature. 

A  hundred  years  later,  and  other  profound  truths 
are  started  by  great  thinkers.  Anaxagoras  is  of  Clazo- 
menae,  but  removes  to  Athens  (which  is  to  become 
the  eye  of  Greece),  and  is  intimate  with  Pericles. 
Starting  from  the  Ionic  point,  he  is  not  satisfied  that 
every  thing  can  be  accounted  for  by  elements,  and  he 
calls  in  an  intelligence  (vovs)  to  arrange  (Bia/cosfjuelv) 
them.  When  Socrates  heard  of  Anaxagoras  bringing  in 
intelligence,  he  sent  for  his  books,  and  was  astonished, 
after  finding  him  arranging  all  things  by  reason, 
employing  "  air,  ether,  water,  and  many  other  things 
out  of  place."  But  this  criticism  of  Socrates,  and  a 
like  criticism  in  the  next  age  by  Aristotle,  show  that 
neither  of  these  philosophers  was  able  to  rise  to  the 
same  elevated  position  as  Anaxagoras  ;  who  was  quite 
consistent  in  holding  that  all  things  might  be  disposed 
by  Divine  reason,  and  yet  be  carried  on  by  physical 
agents,  such  as  "  air,  ether,  and  water."  The  same 
philosopher  contributed  another  thought.     He  repre- 


8  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

sented  nature  as  composed  of  different  things,  made 
up  of  equal  parts  (6/ioio/M€p?j)  ;  thus  starting  the  doctrine 
of  definite  proportions,  which  is  the  true  doctrine  of 
all  chemistry,  and  this  whether  these  proportions  are 
caused  by  atoms  or  no,  or  whether  indeed  there  be 
such  things  as  atoms.  About  the  same  time  Em- 
pedocles,  of  Agrigentum  in  Sicily,  fabled  as  perishing 
in  the  flames  of  Etna  which  he  was  desirous  of  look- 
ing into,  gave  to  the  world  another  imperishable 
thought.  He  used  all  the  four  elements  of  the  older 
philosophers  ;  but  gave  to  them  loves  and  hatreds, 
friendships  and  enmities,  drawing  them  toward  each 
other,  and  driving  them  away  from  each  other.  This 
has  culminated  in  the  idea  of  the  attractive  and  re- 
pulsive powers  of  nature.  We  may  allow  Dr.  Tyndall 
to  give  an  account  of  the  atomic  theory  of  Democritus, 
who  belonged  to  Abdera  in  Thrace.     His  tenets  are  :  — 

"  I.  From  nothing  comes  nothing.  Nothing  that  exists  can  be  de- 
stroyed. All  changes  are  due  to  the  combination  and  separation  of 
molecules.  2.  Nothing  happens  by  chance.  Every  occurrence  has  its 
cause,  from  which  it  follows  by  necessity.  3.  The  only  existing  things 
are  the  atoms  and  empty  space;  all  else  is  mere  opinion.  4.  The 
atoms  are  infinite  in  number,  and  infinitely  various  in  form  ;  they  strike 
together,  and  the  lateral  motions  and  whirlings  which  thus  arise  are 
the  beginnings  of  worlds.  5.  The  varieties  of  all  things  depend  upon 
the  varieties  of  their  atoms,  in  number,  size,  and  aggregation.  6.  The 
soul  consists  of  free,  smooth,  round  atoms,  like  those  of  fire.  These 
are  the  most  mobile  of  all.  They  interpenetrate  the  whole  body,  and  in 
their  motions  the  phenomena  of  life  arise.  Thus  the  atoms  of  Demo- 
critus are  individually  without  sensation  ;  they  combine  in  obedience 
to  mechanical  law  ;  and  not  only  organic  forms,  but  the  phenomena  of 
sensation  and  thought,  are  also  the  result  of  their  combination." 

Some  of  these  points  have  not  been  established.  One 
of  them  seems  to  combine  utterly  incongruous  things  : 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  9 

it  accounts  for  sensations  and  thoughts,  for  pain  and 
pleasure,  for  love  and  hate,  for  judgment  and  deduction, 
for  ideas  of  good  and  evil,  for  noble  aspirations  and 
high  purposes,  by  atoms  smooth  and  round  ;  as  if  there 
was  not  a  fathomless  gap  between  smoothness  and 
sensation,  between  roundness  and  reasoning. 

Immediately  after  this  appeared  the  Sophists,  who 
may  have  done  good  in  some  instances  by  their  pro- 
fessional teaching,  for  which  they  deserved  their  fee : 
but  the  charge  remains  that  they  were  not  seekers 
after  truth  ;  and  it  is  a  fact  that  they  did  not  add  one 
great  principle  to  the  body  of  philosophy,  while  they 
did  much  to  undermine  the  whole  by  maintaining 
that  there  is  no  absolute  truth,  and  that  truth  is  only 
relative  to  the  man  who  "troweth."  Their  chief 
opponent  was  Socrates,  who  formally  announced  one 
great  truth,  which  all  men  had  been  spontaneously 
discerning  and  following,  that  there  are  purpose  and 
design  in  every  part  of  the  animal  frame  :  pointing  to 
the  eye  of  man,  with  its  delicate  structure,  and  to  its 
eyelids,  which  open  and  close  for  the  protection  of  the 
organ  ;  to  the  ear,  which  collects  the  sounds  and  keeps 
them  separate  ;  and  to  the  teeth,  which  in  front  are 
fit  for  cutting,  and  behind  for  grinding.  He  discovers 
everywhere  a  providence,  and  believed  himself  guided, 
not  by  a  daimon,  but  by  a  daimonion,  a  divine  influ- 
ence. His  great  disciple,  Plato,  rose  to  a  grander,  if 
net  a  more  important,  truth,  that  there  is  an  Idea 
which  has  been  in  or  before  the  divine  mind  from 
all  eternity,  which  is  the  pattern  after  which  all  natu- 
ral things  in  heaven  and  earth  are  formed,  and  to  the 


IO  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

contemplation  of  which  the  soul  of  man,  formed  in 
the  image  of  God,  may  rise  as  its  highest  exercise. 
One  of  the  interlocutors  asks  whether  this  paradigm 
is  to  be  seen  in  the  dust  of  the  earth,  and  Socrates, 
who  is  expounding  the  idea,  is  not  able  to  answer; 
in  modern  times  the  scientific  man  would  place  the 
dust  under  the  microscope,  and  show  in  it  the  most 
beautiful  crystalline  forms. 

But  the  philosopher  who  had  the  most  enlarged 
comprehension  of  the  deep  thoughts  embodied  in  the 
universe  was  Aristotle,  great  as  a  metaphysician, 
great  as  a  logician,  and  great  as  a  naturalist.  In  his 
usual  manner,  he  employs  for  explanation  a  very 
familiar  example,  that  of  a  statue  of  Hercules  in  a 
temple.  To  the  question,  What  is  the  cause  of  this 
statue  ?  four  answers  may  be  given  :  as  to  its  matter, 
it  is  made  of  marble  ;  as  to  what  produces  it,  it  is  the 
workman  with  his  hammer  and  chisel  ;  as  to  its  form, 
it  is  a  representation  of  Hercules  ;  as  to  its  end,  it  is 
to  adorn  this  temple.  So,  in  regard  to  every  natural 
object,  we  may  seek  and  find  four  kinds  of  causes, — 
using  the  term  cause  in  a  wider  sense  than  we  now 
do :  a  material  cause,  the  constituents,  say  elements 
or  atoms  ;  the  efficient  cause,  the  power,  divine  or 
creaturely,  working  in  it  ;  the  formal  cause,  the  order 
manifested  in  it,  as  in  the  plant  or  animal ;  and  the 
final  cause,  the  end  which  it,  say  the  eye  or  hand, 
is  meant  to  serve.  I  am  sure  that  Aristotle  is  right 
in  encouraging  us  to  seek  for  all  these  causes  or 
principles  in  nature,  and  that  they  are  taking  a  narrow 
and  unsatisfactory  view  who  are  overlooking  any  one 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  II 

of  them.  In  accounting  for  all  things  by  atoms, 
Tyndall  has  seen  only  one  of  them,  and  that  the  least 
elevated,  —  the  material  cause  ;  and  takes  no  notice, 
though  he  knows  that  they  exist,  of  the  forces  which 
make  the  atoms  play,  or  of  the  beautiful  forms  which 
they  assume,  and  the  beneficent  purposes  which  they 
serve. 

The  Stoics  delighted  to  dwell  on  the  unity  of  the 
universe,  and  pointed  out  its  perfect  harmony.  They 
had  an  anticipative  view  of  the  doctrine  that  heat  will 
at  last  absorb  all  things  into  itself,  out  of  which  a  new 
world  will  issue.  The  atomic  theory  was  adopted 
from  Democritus  by  the  Epicureans,  and  was  wrought 
into  a  gorgeous  form  by  the  Latin  poet  Lucretius. 
Neither  Democritus  nor  Epicurus  was  a  professed 
atheist;  on  the  contrary,  both  held  that  the  gods 
made  themselves  known  to  man  by  images  or  effluxes 
from  heaven.  But  Lucretius  propounds  his  theory 
to  deliver  men  from  all  belief  in  the  gods  and  super- 
stitious fears,  and  represents  death  as  the  cessation 
of  existence.  It  is  instructive  to  observe  what  a  run 
there  is  in  the  present  day  after  Lucretius,  both  by 
classicists  and  physicists.  He  is  declared  to  be  the 
greatest  of  the  Latin  poets,  and  placed  above  Virgil 
and  Horace.  His  arguments  and  his  rich  descriptions 
are  quoted,  and  students  have  to  wade  through  the 
mantled  pool  of  his  erotics  to  pluck  his  flowers.  It 
is  curious  to  notice  how  a  philosophy  seeks  for  and 
creates  a  poetry  suited  to  it.  The  philosophy  of  Epi- 
curus, so  prevalent  among  the  Romans,  culminated 
in  "  De  Rerum  Natura ; "  it  has  to  be  added,  in  the 


12  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

licentious  pictures  on  the  walls  of  Pompeii  and  Her- 
culaneum.  The  philosophy  of  Locke  and  Bolingbroke 
found  appropriate  verses  in  Pope.  The  subjective 
philosophy  of  Kant  came  forth  in  the  grand  German 
poetry  of  the  beginning  of  this  century.  The  physi- 
cal philosophy  of  our  day  has  already  got  a  sensuous 
poetry  in  works  which  will  doubtless  be  followed  by 
others.  It  is  because  philosophy  calls  forth  such 
influences,  that  it  comes  to  have  a  sway  over  national 
character.  We  can  believe  with  Montesquieu  that 
the  Epicurean  philosophy  exercised  an  influence  in 
deteriorating  the  character  of  the  Romans,  in  hasten- 
ing their  ripeness  into  rottenness,  and  determining 
their  fall ;  we  can  understand  this  when  we  look  into 
these  fragments  of  obscene  Epicurean  verses  which 
have  come  out  of  the  fires  of  Pompeii  to  testify  against 
the  inhabitants.  We  confess  that  we  have  fears  of 
the  results  when  the  new  physics  come  to  crystallize 
into  the  creed  of  the  rising  generation,  and  to  lead  the 
literature  and  inspire  the  prevailing  sentiment  of  the 
age. 

Dr.  Tyndall  has  no  appreciation  of  the  benefit  con- 
ferred on  science  by  Christianity  in  introducing  new 
and  lofty  ideas :  in  showing  that  there  is  only  one 
God,  and  thus  preparing  the  way  for  the  doctrine  that 
there  is  a  unity  in  nature ;  in  leading  men  to  expect 
that  there  are  order  and  wisdom  through  all  God's 
works  ;  in  making  the  study  of  nature  a  duty  we  owe 
to  God  ;  and  in  giving  us  exalted  views  of  the  soul  as 
fashioned  after  the  Divine  image.  He  speaks  in  dis- 
paraging language  of  the  scholastic  ages,  whose  func- 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE,  13 

tion  it  was  to  preserve,  all  through  the  cold  winter, 
those  seeds  which  had  been  deposited  by  ancient 
thought,  and  which  were  ready  to  sprout  at  the  return 
of  spring.  He  might  have  spoken  with  more  respect 
of  the  mediaeval  ages,  had  he  reflected  that  in  them 
more  new  metals  were  discovered  than  in  all  the 
Greek  and  Roman  times. 

It  is  an  interesting  circumstance,  that  Bacon  re- 
tained the  four  causes  of  Aristotle,  and  gave  to  each 
of  them  an  important  place  ;  allotting  material  and 
efficient  causes  to  physics,  and  formal  and  final  causes 
to  metaphysics,  which  he  places  above  physics.  The 
grand  end  of  science  is  to  discover,  first,  axioms,  or,  as 
we  call  them,  laws  of  phenomena,  and  finally  causes 
and  forms.  Final  and  formal  causes,  at  the  top  of  the 
pyramid,  lift  us  up  to  God.  It  has  often  been  said 
that  Bacon  set  aside  final  causes.  This  is  an  entire 
mistake.  Right  or  wrong,  he  gave  them  no  place  in 
physics ;  but  he  allotted  them  the  main  place  in 
metaphysics,  the  highest  office  of  which  is  to  carry 
us  to  the  Supreme. 

Mr.  Darwin  represents  Prof.  Huxley  as  the  philoso- 
pher of  his  school !  As  if  to  justify  this,  the  professor 
has  of  late  years  taken  Descartes  under  his  special 
protection,  though  he  does  not  seem  capable  of  under- 
standing, certainly  not  of  appreciating,  the  deeper 
tenets  of  that  greatest  of  French  philosophers.  The 
grand  merit  of  Descartes  is  that  he  drew  the  distinc- 
tion so  definitely  between  matter  and  mind,  between 
extension  and  thought,  showing  that  extension  had 
no  capacity  to  produce  thinking.     Newton,  like  Bacon, 


14  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

was  favorably  inclined  to  the  theory  of  atoms  or  mole- 
cules, but  thought  it  necessary  to  call  in  a  God  to 
arrange  them  and  make  them  work  harmoniously. 
His  great  rival,  the  highest  of  all  the  German  phi- 
losophers, Leibnitz,  in  order  to  account  for  the  opera- 
tions of  nature,  felt  it  necessary  to  call  in,  not  only 
forces,  but  a  pre-established  harmony.  Two  horologes 
keep  the  same  time,  not  by  influencing  each  other 
causally,  but  because  of  a  set  of  agencies  instituted 
in  each  and  issuing  in  the  same  result.  So  through 
all  nature  there  is,  says  Leibnitz,  a  set  of  agencies 
which  do  so  work  that  every  one  thing  operates 
in  harmony  with  every  other.  It  is  here,  if  we  do 
not  mistake,  that  God  finds  the  means  of  answering 
prayer,  which  Dr.  Tyndall  boldly  says  cannot  bring 
a  return.* 

He  gives  us  an  imaginary  conversation  between  a 
disciple  of  Epicurus  and  Bishop  Butler.  Epicurus 
is  fitly  represented ;  but  I  venture  to  say  that,  if 
Butler  were  alive,  he  would  give  a  much  weightier 
defence  than  has  been  put  into  his  mouth  by  the 
President  of  the  British  Association.  The  grand 
merit  of  Butler  is  that  he  has  found  in  the  very  con- 

*  Prayer  is  a  duty ;  and  he  who  prays  believes  that  he  will  receive 
an  answer  in  some  way,  but  may  not  be  able  to  specify  the  way.  It 
may  turn  out  that  the  answer  comes  by  pre-established  harmony,  or, 
what  is  the  same  thing,  by  the  Divine  fore-ordination  proclaimed  in 
Scripture.  The  prayer  and  its  answer  may  be  joined,  not  by  physical 
nor  even  by  causal  connection,  but  in  the  counsels  of  God,  who  has 
planned,  without  at  all  interfering  with  free  will,  that  there  should  be 
both,  and  that  the  answer  should  be  brought  about  by  God's  own 
natural  agents  formed  into  laws  which  "continue  this  day  according 
to  his  ordinances,  for  all  are  his  servants."   (Ps.  cxix.  91.) 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  1 5 

stitution  of  our  nature  the  conscience,  as  a  law  which 
asserts  of  itself  that  it  is  supreme  in  the  mind,  and 
subject  only  to  the  great  Lawgiver  to  whom  it  points. 
In  the  same  century  the  Scotch  philosopher,  Reid, 
demonstrated  that  there  were  principles  in  our  nature, 
self-evident  and  irresistible,  from  which  there  is  no 
appeal;  and  the  great  German  metaphysician,  Kant, 
holds  that  there  are  forms  of  thought  which  are  nec- 
essary and  universal,  and  that  there  is  a  categorical 
imperative  which  guarantees  the  existence  of  God,  the 
Good.  He  who  holds  firmly  by  these  truths  may  let 
men  employ  the  atomic  theory  as  they  please,  to  ac- 
count for  the  constitution  of  the  universe. 

Two  great  scientific  truths  have  been  established 
in  this  century.  One  is  the  doctrine  of  the  conserva- 
tion of  energy,  which  implies  that  all  the  physical 
forces  are  correlated,  and  that  the  sum  of  force, 
potential  and  actual,  in  the  universe,  is  always  one 
and  the  same.  The  men  who  did  most  to  prepare 
the  way  for  this  doctrine  —  such  as  Newton,  Davy, 
Oersted,  Herschel,  and  Faraday  —  all  delighted  to  see 
God  in  his  works  ;  and  the  living  philosopher  who  was  J 
the  main  agent  in  discovering  it,  Dr.  Mayer,  has  a 
mind  filled  with  the  presence  of  God,  and  looks  on 
force  as  the  expression  of  the  Divine  power.  The 
other  great  doctrine  is  that  of  development,  acknowl- 
edged as  having  an  extent  which  was  not  dreamed  of 
till  the  researches  of  Darwin  were  published.  How 
far  evolution  is  to  be  carried  is  a  disputed  point  among 
naturalists.  Darwin  seems  to  have  a  great  antipathy 
to  final  cause  ;  but  he  has  somehow  or  other  convinced 


16 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 


himself  that  there  is  a  God,  and  is  obliged  to  call  in 
three  or  four  germs,  or  at  least  one  germ,  created  by 
God.  It  could  easily  be  shown  that  the  doctrine  of 
development,  properly  understood,  and  kept  within 
inductive  limits,  is  not  inconsistent  with  final  cause ; 
for  we  may  discern  a  plan  and  a  purpose,  means  and 
end,  in  the  way  in  which  plants  and  animals  are 
evolved,  and  in  the  forms  they  take,  which  are  evi- 
dently not  by  chance,  —  if  the  word  has  any  meaning, 

—  or  by  blind  atoms,  but  according  to  a  progression 
foreseen  from  the  first,  and  proceeding  in  a  determined 
order. 

Professor  Tyndall  thinks  he  can  account  for  every 
thing  by  atoms,  and  he  reaches  the  conclusion  that 
there  is  nothing  but  matter.  "Abandoning  all  dis- 
guise, the  confession  I  feel  bound  to  make  before 
you  is,  that  I  prolong  the  vision  backward  across  the 
boundary  of  the  experimental  evidence,  and  discover 
in  that  matter  which  we  in  our  ignorance,  and  not- 
withstanding our  professed  reverence  for  its  Creator, 
have  hitherto  covered  with  opprobrium,  the  promise 
and  potency  of  every  quality  of  life."  "  The  doctrine 
of  evolution  derives  man  in  his  totality  from  the  in- 
teraction of  organism  and  environment  through  count- 
less ages."    A  few  years  ago  Dr.  Tyndall,  in  a  Lecture 

—  now  published  as  an  appendix  to  his  Address,  — 
seemed  to  use  different  language,  and  allowed  freely 
that  we  cannot  see  any  nexus  between  cerebral  action 
and  thought,  or  discover  why  a  movement  of  the  brain 
should  lead  to  mental  exercise.  But  this  was  never 
intended  to  mean  much  ;  for  Dr.  Tyndall  would  say 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE,  1 7 

that  just  as  little  do  we  know  how  oxygen  attracts 
hydrogen.  And  so  he  feels  himself  entitled  to  hold 
that  matter,  though  we  cannot  say  how,  may  give  us 
all  the  operations  of  understanding  and  will. 

He  accounts  for  every  thing  in  our  world  by  atoms. 
This  leads  us  to  inquire  what  we  really  know  about 
these  atoms  of  which  so  much  is  made.  First,  we 
seem  to  be  obliged  by  a  sort  of  necessity  of  thought 
or  speech  to  fall  back  on  some  such  conception.  If 
every  thing  we  see  in  the  world  be  composite,  and 
capable  of  analysis  and  division,  we  have  to  think  and 
talk  of  something  indivisible  and  undecomposable, 
which  we  may  call  particles,  molecules,  or  atoms. 
But  this  necessity  in  thinking  does  not  imply  that 
there  are  any  such  actual  existences,  any  more  than 
the  corresponding  mathematical  ideas  about  points, 
lines,  surface,  show  that  there  is  such  a  thing  as  posi- 
tion without  magnitude,  or  length  without  breadth,  or 
a  surface  without  depth.  For  the  evidence  of  the 
reality  of  an  atom  we  must  appeal,  not  to  pure  thought, 
but  to  observation.  But,  then,  no  one  ever  saw  an 
atom  or  handled  an  atom  ;  the  microscope  has  not  yet 
been  constructed  which  can  see  it,  nor  the  balance 
which  can  weigh  it. 

What  proof  have  we,  then,  of  the  existence  of  such 
indivisibles  ?  The  answer,  as  I  understand,  is  that 
we  require  to  posit  them  to  account  for  the  nature, 
the  structure,  and  the  operations  of  material  sub- 
stances. There  is,  first,  the  fact  that  elementary 
bodies  combine  in  certain  proportions.  All,  how- 
ever, that  this  establishes,  as  our  best  chemists  ac- 


l8  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

knowledge,  is  only  a  doctrine  of  proportions  or 
equivalents.  Dalton  and  others  have  tried  to  ac- 
count for  these  proportions,  by  showing  that  they 
arise  from  atoms  having  specific  weights  and  shapes. 
The  attempt  has  not  been  altogether  satisfactory,  as 
in  chemical  combinations  the  atom,  as  determined 
by  the  balance,  frequently  exhibits  a  wide  range  of 
deportment,  coming  under  the  head  of  what  chemists 
call  quantivalency  or  atomicity.  Secondly,  there  are 
the  mathematical  figures  of  crystals,  which  may  be 
supposed  to  be  built  up  by  regular  shaped  atoms,  just 
as  a  house  is  by  bricks.  Unfortunately,  the  same 
substance,  sulphur  for  example,  takes  allotropic  forms 
which  are  incompatible  ;  that  is,  cannot  proceed  from 
any  one  simple  form  of  atom.  Once  more,  there  is 
the  internal  mobility  of  every  material  substance, 
which  seems  to  show  the  constant  action  of  mole- 
cules, or  at  least  of  something  inconceivably  small. 
Such  considerations  seem  to  make  it  probable  that 
there  are  very  small  bodies  conducting  a  great  part 
of  the  actual  operations  of  nature.  But  every  sage 
man  will  admit  that  what  we  affirm  of  atoms  is  only 
provisionally  true.  Science  in  its  present  state  seems 
to  be  waiting  for  some  new  Newton,  Lavoisier,  Dalton, 
or  Mayer  to  furnish  the  precise  conception  and  ex- 
pression for  what  is  loose,  floating,  and  somewhat 
incongruous.  It  has  to  be  added  that  there  is  an 
increasing  number  of  savants  favorably  disposed  to 
the  theory  of  Leibnitz,  mathematically  expressed  by 
Boscovich,  and  received,  though  vaguely  apprehended, 
by  the  great  experimental  philosopher,  Faraday,  that 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  1 9 

matter  consists  merely  of  centres  of  force  acting  all 
around  them  according  to  certain  laws,  and  producing 
that  resistance  which  we  attribute  to  extended  bodies. 
The  difficulty  pressing  on  this  theory  is,  Can  it  account 
for  the  inertia  of  body  ?  In  these  circumstances,  how 
rash,  with  our  present  knowledge,  to  account  for  the 
whole  formation  and  state  of  the  universe  by  things 
of  which  we  know  so  little  ! 

It  is  admitted  that,  by  the  finest  instrument,  we 
can  discover  matter  only  in  a  molar  state,  that  is,  in 
masses.  The  smallest  possible  mass  is  called  a  mole- 
cule. But  we  are  obliged  to  suppose  that  this  molecule 
is  compound :  the  molecule  of  water  is  composed  of 
oxygen  and  hydrogen  ;  we  can  separate  the  oxygen 
and  the  hydrogen,  —  we  suppose,  the  atom  of  hydrogen 
from  the  atoms  of  oxygen.  We  cannot  have  the  atom 
of  either  of  these  elements  alone  or  by  itself :  we  can 
separate  the  atom  of  hydrogen  only  by  its  being  united 
with  something  else.  Even  when  we  have  pure  hy- 
drogen, we  take  for  granted  that  it  is  composed  of 
molecules  having  two  or  more  atoms  of  hydrogen 
combined. 

Atoms  are  the  smallest  possible  portions  of  matter 
which  can  enter  into  a  combination.  According  to  the 
common  apprehension,  they  are  hard,  impenetrable 
bodies,  with  a  definite  shape,  which  is  unknown,  and 
a  power  of  action,  of  polar  action.  The  negative  end 
of  the  one  attracts  the  positive  end  of  the  other. 
They  act  on  other  atoms  all  through  space,  according 
to  the  mass,  and  on  every  one  atom  according  to  the 
square  of  the  distance.     This  is  in  accordance  with  the 


20  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

doctrine  which  the  author  of  this  paper  has  long  been 
maintaining,  that  all  material  action  consists  in  the  mut- 
ual action  of  two  or  more  bodies  on  each  other,  probably 
in  the  action  on  each  other  of  two  or  more  atoms. 

By  far  the  clearest  and  most  satisfactory  account  of 
molecules  which  we  have  seen  is  in  a  paper  read  before 
the  British  Association  at  Bradford,  in  1873,  by  Prof . 
Clerk  Maxwell,  of  Aberdeen.  The  mass,  weight,  and 
properties  of  a  molecule  are  unalterable.  Though 
indestructible,  it  is  not  hard  or  rigid,  but  is  capable  of 
internal  movements,  and  when  they  are  repeated  it 
emits  rays.  They  are  flying  all  through  the  atmos- 
phere, quicker  than  a  cannon-ball,  at  the  rate  of  about 
seventeen  miles  in  the  minute,  and  they  diffuse  through- 
out nature,  matter  and  momentum  and  temperature. 
We  know  of  three  distinguished  men  who  have  been 
trying  to  discover  their  size  and  weight :  Loschmidt, 
Mr.  Stoney,  of  Dublin,  and  Sir  William  Thomson,  of 
Glasgow  ;  and,  it  is  calculated  that  about  two  millions 
of  molecules  of  hydrogen  in  a  row  would  occupy  a 
millimetre  ;  and  that  in  a  cubic  centimetre  of  any  gas, 
at  a  standing  pressure  and  temperature,  there  are 
about  nineteen  million  million  million  molecules.  A 
million  million  million  million  of  them  would  weigh 
between  four  and  five  grammes. 

Mr.  Maxwell  arrives  at  a  much  more  philosophical 
conclusion  than  Dr.  Tyndall :  "  The  exact  quality  of 
each  molecule  to  all  others  of  the  same  kind  gives  it,  as 
Sir  John  Herschel  has  well  said,  the  essential  character 
of  a  manufactured  article,  and  precludes  the  idea  of  its 
being  eternal  and  self-existent."     He  discovers  in  the 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  21* 

very  nature  and  properties  of  a  molecule  a  proof  of 
design  :  "  A  -  collocation,'  to  use  the  expression  of  Dr. 
Chalmers,  '  of  things  which  we  have  no  difficulty  in 
imagining  to  have  been  arranged  otherwise.'"  He 
thus  closes:  "Though  in  the  course  of  ages  catas- 
trophes have  occurred  and  may  yet  occur  in  the 
heavens,  though  ancient  systems  may  be  dissolved  and 
new  systems  evolved  out  of  their  ruins,  the  moleclues 
out  of  which  these  systems  are  built  —  the  foundation- 
stones  of  the  material  universe  —  remain  unbroken  and 
unworn.  They  continue  this  day  as  they  were  created, 
perfect  in  number  and  measure  and  weight ;  and,  from 
the  ineffaceable  characters  inpressed  on  them,  we  may 
learn  that  those  aspirations  after  accuracy  in  meas- 
urement, truth  in  statement,  and  justice  in  action, 
which  we  reckon  our  noblest  attributes  as  men,  are 
ours  because  they  are  essential  constituents  of  the  / 
image  of  Him,  who,  in  the  beginning,  created  not  only 
the  heaven  and  the  earth,  but  the  materials  of  which 
heaven  and  earth  consist." 

To  show  how  little  agreement  there  is  among  sci- 
entific men  as  to  the  constitution  of  matter,  I  may 
quote  the  language  of  an  original  observer  and  a  sug- 
gestive writer,  Prof.  T.  Sterry  Hunt,  in  a  paper  read 
at  the  Centennial  of  Chemistry:  "  In  chemical  change 
the  uniting  bodies  come  to  occupy  the  same  space  at 
the  same  time,  and  the  impenetrability  of  matter  is 
seen  to  be  no  longer  a  fact,  the  volume  of  the  com- 
bining masses  is  confounded,  and  all  the  physical 
and  physiological  characters  which  are  our  guides  in 
the  region  of  physics  fail  us,  gravity  alone  excepted  : 


22  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

the  diamond  dissolves  in  oxygen  gas,  and  the  identity 
of  chlorine  and  sodium  are  lost  in  that  of  sea  salt. 
To  say  that  chemical  union  is  in  its  essence  identifi- 
cation, as  Hegel  has  defined  it,  appears  to  me  the 
simplest  statement  conceivable.  The  type  of  the 
chemical  process  is  found  in  whatever  form  which  it 
is  possible,  under  changed  physical  conditions,  to 
regenerate  the  original  species.  Can  our  science 
affirm  more  than  this  ?  and  are  we  not  going  beyond 
the  limits  of  a  sound  philosophy,  when  we  endeavor,  by 
hypotheses  of  hard  particles  with  void  spaces,  of  atoms 
and  molecules  with  bonds  and  links,  to  explain  chem- 
ical affinities  ?  And  when  we  give  a  concrete  form  to 
our  mechanical  conceptions  of  the  great  laws  of  defi- 
nite and  multiple  proportions  to  which  the  chemical 
process  is  subordinated,  let  us  not  confound  the 
image  with  the  thing  itself ;  until,  in  the  language  of 
Brodie,  in  the  discussion  of  this  very  question,  we 
mistake  the  suggestions  of  fancy  for  the  reality  of 
nature  and  we  cease  to  distinguish  between  conjecture 
and  fact."  The  difficulty  is  not  removed  by  this  doc- 
trine, nor  is  the  subject  made  more  comprehensible  by 
the  Hegelian  expression  (for  it  is  nothing  else)  identi- 
fication ;  for  we  still  put  the  question,  what  are  the 
things  which  thus  occupy  the  same  space  at  the  same 
time,  which  are  thus  dissolved,  thus  seen  to  be  identi- 
cal ?     Atoms  ?  or  what  else  ? 

Atoms  and  molecules  are  admissible,  because  they  so 
far  account  for  the  shapes  and  activities  of  molar  mat- 
ter falling  under  the  senses.  But  they  do  not  explain, 
and  do  not  even  seem  to  explain,  the  laws  and  opera- 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  23 

tions  of  mind, — of  sensation,  judgment,  reason;  of 
love,  passion,  resolution.  There  is  no  proof  that 
therels  sensation  in  any  one  of  these  atoms,  or  that 
sensation  will  be  produced  by  two  or  more  of  them 
striking  against  each  other.  We  may  be  able  to 
account  for  the  shapes  of  a  stone  or  mountain,  of  a 
planet  or  star,  by  atomic  agglomerations.  But  can 
we,  with  any  appearance  of  plausibility,  account  in 
this  way  for  the  affection  of  a  mother  for  her  son,  of  a 
patriot  for  his  country,  of  a  Christian  for  his  Saviour  ? 
Aggregate  them  as  you  choose,  and  let  them  dance  as 
they  will,  there  does  not  seem  to  be  any  power  in  them 
to  generate  the  fancies  of  Shakespeare,  —  his  Hamlet, 
his  Lady  Macbeth,  his  King  Lear,  —  the  sublimities 
of  Milton,  the  penetration  of  Newton,  or  the  moral 
grandeur  of  the  death  of  Socrates.  We  can  conceive 
them  to  fashion  the  bodily  shape  of  Prof.  Tyndall  as 
he  addressed  the  Belfast  audience  ;  but  we  have  some 
difficulty  in  conceiving  how  they  should  compose  the 
discourse  which  he  delivered,  —  not  only  the  words 
but  the  thoughts,  the  theories,  —  and  give  rise  to  the 
approbations  and  disapprobations  in  the  minds  of  his 
audience.  Atoms  may  come  in  appropriately  enough 
in  the  one  case  ;  but  all,  except  those  who  have  gazed  \ 
so  long  on  them  that  they  have  become  magnified 
beyond  their  proper  bulk,  feel  that  they  have  no  fit- 
ting place  in  the  other.  What  —  to  employ  the  very 
mildest  form  of  rebuke  —  can  be  the  use  of  devising 
hypotheses  which  have  not  even  the  semblance  of 
explaining  the  phenomena  ?  In  the  interest  of  sci-l 
ence,  not  to  speak  of  religion,  it  is  of  moment  at  this 


24  IDEAS  IN  NATURE, 

present  time  to  lay  an  arrest  on  such  rash  speculations  ; 
and  to  insist  on  scientific  men  refraining  from  what 
Bacon  denounces  as  "anticipations  of  nature,"  and 
confining  themselves  to  facts  and  the  co-ordination 
of  facts. 

"I  am  blamed,"  says  our  lecturer,  "for  crossing  the 
boundary  of  the  experimental  evidence.  I  reply  that 
this  is  the  habitual  action  of  the  scientific  mind,  at 
least  of  that  portion  of  it  which  applies  itself  to  physi- 
cal investigation."  He  tells  us  that  "  the  kingdom  of 
science  cometh  not  by  observation  and  experiment 
alone,  but  is  completed  by  fixing  the  roots  of  obser- 
vation and  experiment  in  a  region  inaccessible  to  both, 
and  in  dealing  with  which  we  are  forced  to  fall  back 
upon  the  picturing  power  of  the  mind."  Is  this  a  safe 
ground  on  which,  it  seems,  a  certain  portion  of  the 
scientific  mind  has  fallen  back,  "upon  the  picturing 
power  of  the  mind  "  ?  Every  one  knows  how  apt  the 
mind  is  to  picture  things  which  have  no  reality,  and 
how  apt  every  mind  would  be,  on  such  a  system,  to 
draw  its  own  pictures.  It  is  surely  time  to  lay  a  re- 
straint of  a  stringent  kind  upon  the  use,  or  rather 
abuse,  of  the  imagination  in  science.  It  is  curious  to 
notice  that,  while  M.  Comte,  the  founder  of  the  Posi- 
tive School,  sought  to  restrain  science  to  the  obser- 
vation of  phenomena,  meaning  by  phenomena  only 
sensible  phenomena,  the  school  which  has  sprung  from 
him  has  broken  his  trammels,  and  is  revelling  in  all 
sorts  of  hypotheses,  about  the  origin  of  things,  about 
world-making  and  world-ending.  Mr.  Mill  is  partly 
responsible  for  this.     The  book  on  Induction  in  his 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  25 

"Logic  "  is  a  very  valuable  one  ;  but  he  has  dwelt  rr.ore 
on  the  mental  processes  involved  than  on  what  Bacon 
places  first  and  last,  —  the  gathering  of  facts,  the  col- 
lation of  facts,  with  the  "  necessary  rejections  and 
exclusions."  The  process  recommended  by  Mill  is 
deduction  rather  than  induction :  it  consists  in  form- 
ing hypotheses,  in  deducing  from  them,  and  in  verify- 
ing them.  So  we  have  now,  cold  Positivism  having 
been  broken  up,  a  freshet  of  hypotheses :  the  atomic 
hypothesis,  the  development  hypothesis,  the  pangene- 
sis hypothesis,  —  no  one  of  which,  it  is  acknowledged, 
is  capable  of  direct  proof.  I  am  not  maintaining  that 
hypotheses  should  never  be  devised.  But  there  never 
was  more  need  than  now  of  imposing  restrictions  upon 
them.  First,  an  hypothesis  should  not  be  started  till 
there  has  been  an  extensive  induction  of  facts  ;  and 
the  hypothesis  should  grow  out  of  the  facts,  and 
not  out  of  the  picturing  power  of  the  mind.  Sec- 
ondly, it  should  be  regarded  by  those  who  advance  it, 
and  be  announced  by  those  who  use  it,  as  a  mere 
hypothesis,  till  such  time  as  it  is  established.  Thirdly, 
the  apparent  exceptions  should  be  noted  and  stated  ; 
i.  e.y  the  hypothesis  should  be  modified  so  as  to  take 
in  these,  and  not  be  adopted  till  it  explains  them. 
Fourthly,  an  hypothesis,  as  long  as  it  is  a  mere  hy- 
pothesis, should  not  be  employed  to  establish  a  doc- 
trine, say  a  religious  or  an  anti-religious  one. 

I  admit  that  we  may  legitimately  cross  the  boundary 
of  experimental  evidence,  taking  "experimental"  in 
its  restricted  sense.  But  as  we  do  so,  let  us  know  and 
acknowledge  that  we  are  doing  so,  and  clearly  announce 


26  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

what  other  method  we  are  following,  and  let  not  this 
be  the  pictorial  one.  Physical  science,  as  science, 
should  be  rigidly  confined  to  experimental  evidence  ; 
and,  as  the  "  British  Association  "  professes  to  be  for 
"  the  advancement  of  science,"  the  places  inviting  the 
meetings  should  let  those  who  manage  the  society 
know  that  they  should  confine  themselves  to  their 
own  rich  and  ample  domain. 

I  acknowledge  that  there  are  means  of  reaching 
truth  other  than  mere  experiment.  Mental,  as  well  as 
material  facts,  are  to  be  observed  and  weighed  by 
those  who  would  reach  the  higher  and  deeper  verities 
of  nature.  Some  truths  are  known  by  intuition,  and 
called  first  truths  ;  some  are  reached  by  deduction,  as 
in  mathematics  ;  and  more  by  a  judicious  combination 
of  intuition,  induction,  and  deduction.  But  let  these 
methods,  and  the  principles  or  facts  they  employ, 
be  distinguished  in  the  mind  of  the  investigator, 
and  be  kept  separate  in  the  exposition  of  his  views. 
The  mixing  of  these  things  leads  to  their  being  con- 
founded, and  the  issue  is  utter  confusion.  How  pro- 
found the  wisdom  in  the  warning  of  Bacon,  "  This  folly 
is  the  more  to  be  prevented  and  restrained,  because 
not  only  fantastical  philosophy,  but  heretical  religion, 
spring  from  the  absurd  mixture  of  things  divine 
and  human  ! "  Bacon  maintained  that  men  could  go 
beyond  mere  material  and  efficient  causes  to  other  and 
higher,  —  to  final  and  formal.  But  he  allotted  these 
last  to  a  separate  department.  While  he  confined 
physics  to  material  and  efficient  causes,  he  reserved 
for  metaphysics  the  inquiry  into  the  final  and  formal. 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  2*] 

Combining  the  other  allowable  modes  of  inquiry  with 
the  experimental,  we  may  discover  great  principles 
overlooked  by  Tyndall,  but  having  a  deep  foundation 
in  nature.     Let  us  look  at  some  of  these. 

Intelligence.  Dr.  Tyndall  refers  to  some  great  man 
not  named  by  him.  "  Did  I  not  believe,"  said  a  great 
man  to  me  once,  "  that  an  Intelligence  is  at  the  heart 
of  things,  my  life  on  earth  would  be  intolerable." 
Surely  Dr.  Tyndall's  acquaintanceship  must  be  con- 
fined to  a  very  small  circle,  if  he  has  only  met  with 
one  man  uttering  such  a  sentiment.  It  is  the  spon- 
taneous feeling  of  humanity.  Anaxagoras  only  ex- 
pressed what  all  men,  not  led  astray  by  sophistry,  had 
felt  ;  and  he  was  farther  right  when  he  believed  that 
the  presence  of  Intelligence  was  quite  compatible 
with  the  operation  of  physical  agents.  / 

We  are  not  inquiring  at  present  whether  pantheism 
or  theism  is  the  right  view,  whether  the  intelligence 
is  in  nature  or  beyond  nature:  this  subject  will  be 
taken  up  farther  on.  We  are  not  inquiring  whether 
there  is  an  inherent  life  in  nature,  or  whether  its 
activity  springs  from  exquisitely  nice  adaptations  made 
by  a  power  above  them.  In  either  case  we  are  com- 
pelled, if  we  would  account  for,  if  we  would  get  a 
solution  of,  what  is  evident,  to  maintain  that  there  is 
mind  in  nature.  Professor  Tyndall  gives  a  clear  ac- 
count of  the  Lucretian  way  of  explaining  apparent 
design :  "  The  interaction  of  the  atoms  throughout 
infinite  time  rendered  all  manner  of  combinations 
possible.  Of  these,  the  fit  ones  persisted,  while  the 
unfit  ones  disappeared.     Not  after  sage  deliberation 


28  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

did  the  atoms  station  themselves  in  their  right  places, 
nor  did  they  bargain  what  motions  they  should  assume. 
From  all  eternity  they  have  been  driven  together  ;  and, 
after  trying  motions  and  unions  of  every  kind,  they 
fell  at  length  into  the  arrangements  out  of  which  this 
system  of  things  has  been  formed."  Bacon  and  New- 
.  ton  were  favorably  inclined  toward  the  atomic  theory 
of  matter;  but  then  they  thought  that  blind  atoms 
were  as  capable  of  working  disorderly  as  orderly,  of 
producing  evil  as  producing  good,  and  in  the  order 
and  benevolence  in  the  world  they  saw  proofs  of  an 
organizing  power.  "  Even  that  school,"  says  Bacon, 
"  which  is  most  accused  of  atheism,  doth  the  most 
demonstrate  religion  ;  that  is  the  school  of  Leucippus 
and  Democritus  and  Epicurus.  For  it  is  a  thousand 
times  more  credible  that  four  mutable  elements  and 
one  immutable  fifth  essence,  duly  and  eternally  placed, 
need  no  God,  than  that  an  army  of  infinite  small 
portions  or  seeds,  unplaced,  should  have  produced  this 
order  and  beauty  without  a  divine  marshal." 

But  it  is  said  that  the  fit  survive  while  the  unfit 
perish.  We  are  inclined  to  discover  an  ordinance  of 
intelligence  and  benevolence  in  the  very  circumstance 
that  there  is  a  fitness,  and  that  the  fit  survive.  Things 
might  all  have  been  such  that  there  was  no  fitness  in 
them,  and  the  most  unfit  might  have  survived.  That 
things  are  otherwise,  we  can  explain  only  by  supposing 
that  in  the  original  structure  of  the  atoms  there  was 
a  fitness  to  produce  fit  things,  and  to  secure  that  they 
should  survive.  We  hold  that'the  forms  or  potencies, 
one  or  both,  of  atoms  must  originally  have  been  such 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  20) 

as  to  make  them  fit  for  building  up  the  temple.  The 
fit  survive  because  they  have  the  fitness  to  do  so,  and 
are  placed  in  a  state  of  things  in  which  they  can  sur- 
vive because  of  their  nature.  It  is  conceivable  that 
things  might  have  been  otherwise,  that  the  atoms 
might  have  been  such  as  to  be  incapable  of  order, 
and  the  unfit  have  survived  to  work  never-ceasing 
disorder ;  and,  when  sentient  beings  appeared,  to 
produce  only  misery.  But  it  is  said  that  in  that  case 
the  suffering  would  instantly  perish.  Yes,  as  things 
are  now  constituted  ;  but  things  might  have  been  so 
constituted  that  the  suffering  could  not  perish,  that 
innocent  sufferers  must  suffer  for  ever.  All  those 
assumptions  about  the  fittest  surviving  proceed  tacitly 
on  the  principle  that  there  is  an  established  fitness  in 
things  so  to  do. 

Final  cause.  On  this  point  Socrates  was  only  ex- 
pressing what  all  thinking  minds  have  spontaneously 
felt  from  the  beginning,  that  there  is  evident  purpose 
in  the  universe  ;  means  and  end,  —  the  means  being 
also  ends  and  the  ends  means  to  something  farther. 
Aristotle  placed  the  whole  subject  in  a  truly  philo- 
sophic position,  when  he  showed  that  we  should  seek 
for  four  kinds  of  explanatory  causes  or  principles  in 
nature.  We  may  seek  for  a  material  and  efficient 
cause  :  these  are  the  atoms,  and  the  forces  for  such 
there  must  be  —  operating  in  them.  But,  then,  we 
may  also  seek  for  a  formal  and  final  cause :  in  the 
atoms  being  made  by  their  forces  to  assume  the 
shapes  which  we  see  in  the  plant  and  in  the  animal, 
and  to  conspire  to  fashion  the  ear  by  which  we  hear. 


30  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

and  the  eye  by  which  we  see,  and  the  hand  by  which 
we  grasp.  There  is  no  inconsistency,  though  narrow 
minds  may  be  led  to  believe  that  there  is,  between 
these  different  kinds  of  causes.  The  matter  of  the 
universe  and  the  powers  of  the  universe  are  made  to 
combine  and  conspire  to  produce  these  beautiful  laws 
and  types,  and  accomplish  these  beneficent  ends. 
The  discovery  of  efficient  cause  does  not  set  aside 
final  cause.  The  final  cause  is  in  many  cases  more 
obvious  than  the  efficient.  That  the  coats,  humors, 
shapes,  and  nerves  of  the  eye  were  made  to  combine 
to  form  an  image  on  the  retina  whereby  the  percipient 
sees,  is  a  proof  of  intention,  and  this  whether  physi- 
ologists are  or  are  not  able  to  discover  the  processes 
by  which  the  eye  is  produced. 

It  is  a  characteristic  of  the  whole  school  of  materi- 
alists that  they  speak  disparagingly  of  final  cause. 
And  I  confess  at  once  that  some  defenders  of  natural 
religion  at  times  speak  of  God  as  if  he  were  a  mere 
mechanician,  —  a  sort  of  higher  mechanist,  or  clock- 
maker.  I  farther  allow  that  there  are  minds  which 
dwell  only  on  curious  fitnesses  and  small  providences, 
and  in  fact  discover  in  nature  purposes  which  God 
never  intended.  We,  whose  range  of  vision  is  so 
limited,  should  conduct  our  inquiries  into  the  intents 
of  an  omniscient  God,  with  humility  and  the  pro- 
foundest  reverence.  By  all  means  let  us  notice  those 
nice  adaptations  and  minute  providences  everywhere 
forcing  themselves  on  our  attention,  but  let  us  so 
widen  our  vision  as  to  see  that  these  are  fittings  of  a 
very  large  machine  or  organism,  in  which  the  ends 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  31 

are  means  and  the  means  are  ends,  and  in  which  the 
particular  providences  are  essential  parts  of  a  uni- 
versal providence  which  looks  to  the  whole,  and  makes 
every~part  conspire  to  the  good  of  the  all. 

Hugh  Miller,  in  criticising  "  The  Vestiges  of  Crea- 
tion," remarks  that  there  is  nothing  in  the  doctrine  ! 
there  set  forth  inconsistent  with  final  cause  or  the 
belief  in  the  existence  of  God,  though  it  seems  to  be 
incompatible  with  the  Scripture  account  of  the  origin 
of  man.  Agassiz  and  others  have  shown  that  there 
is  a  plan  in  the  way  in  which  plants  and  animals  have 
appeared  on  the  earth,  and  the  evidence  of  this 
would  not  be  set  aside  though  we  should  discover  that 
this  was  produced  by  natural  selection,  or  some  other 
physical  agency.  Even  though  the  Darwinian  theory 
should  turn  out  to  be  true  in  all  its  main  principles, 
as  it  is  certainly  true  in  some  of  its  principles,  there 
would  still  be  traces  of  design  everywhere  in  nature 
in  the  manner  in  which  natural  agencies  have  been 
made  to  conspire  to  produce  beneficent  ends.  I  am 
convinced  that  when  the  method  of  God's  procedure 
in  producing  animated  beings  is  fully  unfolded,  it 
will  display  innumerable  traces  of  the  fitness  of  the 
time  and  way  in  which  new  species  have  been  intro- 
duced, whether  by  natural  or  supernatural  means. 
But  the  advocates  of  this  theory,  led  by  Mr.  Darwin 
himself,  have,  commonly,  been  speaking  contemptu- 
ously of  final  cause,  and  been  seeking  to  efface  all  the 
inscriptions  on  nature  which  seem  to  read,  "  I  am  a 
creature  of  God."  Yet  in  spite  of  their  opposition  to 
teleology,  these   men   are   coming  face  to  face  with 


32  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

striking  examples  of  it.  Dr.  Tyndall,  gives  us  one  of 
these  from  Mr.  Darwin  :  "  Take  the  marvellous  obser- 
vation which  he  cites  from  Dr.  Criiger,  where  a  bucket, 
with  an  aperture  serving  as  a  spout,  is  formed  in  an 
orchid.  Bees  visit  the  flower ;  in  eager  search  after 
material  for  their  combs  they  push  each  other  into 
the  bucket,  the  drenched  ones  escaping  from  their 
involuntary  bath  by  the  spout.  Here  they  rub  their 
backs  against  the  viscid  stigma  of  the  flower,  and 
obtain  glue  ;  then  against  the  pollen  masses,  which 
are  thus  stuck  to  the  back  of  the  bee,  and  carried 
away."  He  then  quotes  Darwin :  " '  When  the  bee, 
thus  provided,  flies  to  another  flower,  or  to  the  same 
flower  a  second  time,  and  is  pushed  by  its  comrades 
into  the  bucket,  and  then  crawls  out  by  the  passage, 
the  pollen  mass  upon  its  back  necessarily  comes  first 
into  contact  with  the  viscid  stigma,'  which  takes  up 
the  pollen  ;  and  this  is  how  that  orchid  is  fertilized. 
Or,  take  this  other  case  of  the  Catasetum.  l  Bees 
visit  these  flowers  in  order  to  gnaw  the  labellum  ;  in 
doing  this  they  inevitably  touch  a  long,  tapering,  sen- 
sitive projection.  This,  when  touched,  transmits  a 
sensation  of  vibration  to  a  certain  membrane,  which 
is  instantly  ruptured,  setting  free  a  spring,  by  which 
the  pollen  mass  is  shot  forth  like  an  arrow  in  the 
right  direction,  and  adheres,  by  its  viscid  extremity, 
to  the  back  of  the  bee.'  In  this  way  the  fertilizing 
pollen  is  spread  abroad." 

Tyndall  tells  us  that  Darwin's  books  are  a  "  reposi- 
tory of  the  most  startling  facts  of  this  description," 
as,  for  instance,  his   account  of   the  ways  in  which 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  33 

insects  and  birds  carry  the  pollen  from  one  plant  to 
another.  In  due  time  a  Paley  will  arise  to  furnish 
proofs  of  design  from  such  facts  as  these.  Darwin 
will  supply  the  facts,  and  we  are  just  as  capable  as  he  \) 
of  perceiving  their  meaning.  He  may  reject  teleology, 
but  his  facts  are  teleological  whether  he  acknowledges 
it  or  no.  V 

"^Professor  Huxley  has  a  good  deal  of  the  Arab  in  his 
character,  and  rather  delights  to  have  his  hand  against 
every  man  —  except  those  of  his  own  tribe  ;  but  is 
irritated,  I  am  told,  when  he  finds,  in  consequence, 
every  man's  hand  against  him.  His  Bedouin  attacks 
show  courage,  and  make  him  a  favorite  with  John 
Bull,  who  likes  openness  of  speech.  There  is  also, 
I  suspect,  some  irony  in  his  nature.  He  must  have 
been  in  rather  a  quizzing  humor,  when  he  discussed, 
before  a  Belfast  audience,  the  Cartesian  question, 
whether  the  lower  animals  are  mere  automata,  and 
urged  so  many  arguments  to  show  that  they  are, 
adding  that  these  arguments  had  not  convinced  him. 
My  idea  of  his  secret  intention  in  this  lecture  is,  that 
he  means  to  drive  us  to  some  sort  of  potential  life,  or 
pangenesis  in  all  matter.  In  conducting  this  discus- 
sion, he  furnishes  us  with  a  very  beautiful  instance 
of  adaptation  in  the  animal  frame,  an  adaptation  alto- 
gether independent  of  the  mind  or  will  of  the  animal. 
He  takes  a  frog  deprived  of  senses  and  of  feeling,  and 
he  puts  it  on  his  hand  :  "  If  you  incline  your  hand, 
doing  it  very  gently  and  slowly,  so  that  the  frog 
would  naturally  tend  to  slip  off,  you  feel  the  creature's 
forepaws  getting  a  little  on  to  the  edge  of  your  hand 


34  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

until  he  can  just  hold  himself  there,  so  that  he  does 
not  fall ;  then,  if  you  turn  your  hand,  he  mounts  up 
with  great  care  and  deliberation,  putting  one  leg  in 
front  and  then  another,  till  he  balances  himself  with 
perfect  precision  upon  the  edge  of  your  hand  ;  then, 
if  you  turn  your  hand  over,  he  goes  through  the  oppo- 
site set  of  operations,  until  he  comes  to  sit  with  per- 
fect security  on  the  back  of  your  hand.  The  doing 
of  all  this  requires  a  delicacy  of  co-ordination,  and  an 
adjustment  of  the  muscular  apparatus  of  the  body, 
which  is  only  comparable  to  that  of  a  rope-dancer 
among  ourselves." 

We  are  glad  to  have  the  description  of  the  fact  from 
Mr.  Huxley ;  and  we  reckon  ourselves  quite  as  enti- 
tled to  judge  of  its  meaning  as  he  is.  But  they  tell 
us  that  we  are  not  to  look  on  this  wonderful  adjust- 
ment as  implying  design  or  a  purpose  :  this  is  degrad- 
ing to  God,  as  making  him  a  mere  artificer,  and  is  a 
technic,  mechanical,  anthropomorphic  view.  Now,  it 
is  always  to  be  borne  in  mind,  that  God  is  represented 
as  saying,  "  My  thoughts  are  not  your  thoughts,  neither 
are  your  ways  my  ways,  saith  the  Lord."  The  error 
of  anthropomorphism,  of  which  the  school  have  such 
a  horror,  does  not  consist  in  supposing  that  God  has 
qualities  like  those  of  man.  But  it  consists  in  holding 
that  God  has  no  other  qualities  but  those  which  man 
has,  or  in  maintaining  that  these  exist  in  God  after  the 
same  manner  as  they  do  in  man,  or  in  attributing  to  the 
Divine  Being  the  weaknesses  of  humanity.  We  shall 
have  to  abnegate  our  intelligence,  if  we  are  not  allowed 
to  discover  an  intelligence  in  nature  as  we  discover 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  35 

intelligence  in  human  workmanship.  We  are  not 
degrading  God  when  we  ascribe  to  him  the  wisdom 
which  we  see  exhibited  in  a  small  way  by  his  creat- 
ures, provided  we  make  it  infinite  in  extent.  We  do 
not  impose  our  qualities  on  the  Divine  Being  ;  but  we 
claim  to  be  formed  in  his  image,  and  to  reflect  some- 
thing of  the  light  of  his  perfections. 

Laws  ci7id  Types.  This  was  the  grand  truth  ex- 
pounded by  Plato  under  the  name  of  Ideas,  and  car- 
ried out  by  Aristotle  under  the  designation  of  Formal 
Causes.  Every  one  sees  it  in  the  seasons  and  revolu- 
tions of  the  heavenly  bodies,  in  the  plant,  in  the 
animal,  and  the  human  form.  All  science  illustrates 
it.  The  laws  of  physics  and  chemistry  are  expressed 
in  numbers  implying  definite  proportions.  The  guid- 
ing principle  in  botany  and  zoology  is  type ;  that  is, 
regulated  structure  and  model  form.  The  laws  of 
nature,  as  they  are  called,  are  most  of  them  complex, 
being  the  result  of  arrangements  with  conspiring 
agencies.  This  is  the  case  with  the  seasons,  with  the 
elliptic  orbits  of  the  planets,  with  the  cycles  of  the 
sidereal  movements  :  all  are  constructions  in  which 
various  matters  and  forces  combine  and  co-operate. 
Possibly  all  these  constructions  may  carry  us  back 
ultimately  to  the  forms  and  properties  of  atoms  and 
their  collocations  ;  but  in  that  case  there  must  have 
been  a  plan  in  what  has  produced  such  results.      / 

A  Universal  Harmony.  The  Pythagoreans  sought 
for  a  music  in  all  nature.  The  Stoics  maintained  that 
the  harmony  was  perfect,  and  ascribed  it  to  the  Fatum, 
—  the  word  or  will  of  Deity.    Modern  science  establishes 


36  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

what  was  then  a  mere  surmise.  Astronomy  shows  us 
order  and  uniformity  in  the  utmost  regions  of  space. 
Geology  exhibits  the  same  laws  operating  for  unnum- 
bered ages.  The  spectroscope  discovers  the  same 
elements  in  the  most  distant  stars  as  we  have  on  our 
earth.  The  doctrine  of  the  conservation  of  force  lets 
us  see  how  it  is  that  our  world  is  so  stable,  while  it 
points  not  unobscurely  to  a  time  when  all  things  will 
be  burned  up. 

This  harmony  appears  to  the  writer  of  this  paper 
to  take  two  forms.  First,  there  is  the  adaptation 
of  the  properties  of  one  body  to  those  of  another, 
whereby  they  act  and  react  on  each  other,  atom  on 
atom,  molecule  on  molecule,  mass  on  mass,  all  to 
produce  harmonious  results.  Secondly,  there  is  the 
pre-established  harmony  propounded  by  Leibnitz,  —  a 
harmony  produced  not  by  one  body  acting  on  another, 
but  by  the  original  disposition  of  agents,  whereby 
results  are  produced  which  fit  into  each  other. 

Life.  The  whole  school  are  obliged  to  confess  that 
they  cannot  explain  every  thing  by  atoms  or  by  any 
machinery  at  their  disposal.  They  acknowledge  that 
there  is  no  known  law  of  nature  which  can  brin°-  ani- 
mated  beings  out  of  inanimate  objects.  Dr.  Tyndall 
indeed  says  :  "  Those  who  have  occupied  themselves 
with  the  beautiful  experiments  of  Plateau  will  remem- 
ber that,  when  two  spherules  of  olive  oil,  suspended 
in  a  mixture  of  alcohol  and  water  of  the  same  density 
as  the  oil,  are  brought  together,  they  do  not  imme- 
diately unite.  Something  like  a  pellicle  appears  to  be 
formed  around  the  drops,  the  rupture  of  which  is  im- 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  37 

mediately  followed  by  the  coalescence  of  the  globiles 
into  one.  There  are  organisms  whose  vital  actions  are 
almost  as  purely  physical  as  that  of  these  drops  of 
oil"  True,  but  these  drops  of  oil  are  after  all  physical 
and  not  organic.  Mr.  Darwin,  to  help  him  out  of  his 
difficulties,  is  obliged  to  call  in  more  than  natural 
selection.  He  holds  that  there  is  a  pangenesis  or 
panzoism  in  all  animated  being.  Now,  what  is  this 
but  the  "  life  "  of  the  old  zoologists  whom  they  so  ridi- 
cule"? It  is  clear  that,  after  they  have  made  atoms 
perform  all  sorts  of  dances,  there  still  remains  a  resid- 
uum which  atoms  cannot  explain  ;  and  it  would  be 
wiser  in  them,  before  they  go  on  speculating  so  wildly, 
to  employ  years  of  patient  inductive  observation  and 
experiment  to  determine  what  this  —  I  will  not  call  it 
life,  but  —  pangenesis  is. 

Mr.  Darwin  is  obliged,  to  account  for  life,  to  call 
in  three  or  four  original  germs,  or  at  least  one  germ, 
created  by  God.  Dr.  Tyndall  and  the  younger  mem- 
bers of  the  school  are  not  satisfied  with  this  com- 
promise. "  The  anthropomorphism  which  it  seemed 
his  object  to  set  aside  is  as  firmly  associated  with 
the  creation  of  a  few  forms  as  with  the  creation  of 
a  multitude."  Not  satisfied  with  Darwin,  he  falls 
back  on  Spencer.  Mr.  Spencer  has  given  us  one 
of  the  weakest  and  most'unsatisfactory  definitions 
of  life  ever  propounded :  "  It  is  a  continuous  adjust- 
ment of  internal  relations  to  external  relations."  Dr. 
Tyndall  says  :  c<  The  organism  is  played  upon  by  the 
environment,  and  is  modified  to  meet  the  require- 
ments of  the  environment."     The  difficulty  is  dex- 


V 


38  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

terously  avoided  by  this  loose  statement.  For  the 
difficulty  is  to  get  the  organism  which  is  to  act  on  the 
environment.  It  is  the  action  of  the  organism  on 
the  environment,  the  action  of  a  living  body  on  inani- 
mate matter,  that  is  the  thing  to  be  accounted  for ; 
and  this  is  carefully  avoided. 

Mind  in  Man.  It  is  at  this  point  that  the  theory  is 
felt  to  be  weakest  —  is  seen  visibly  to  break  down. 
There  is  no  appearance  of  plausibility  in  the  state- 
ment that  atoms  can  produce  sensation,  pleasure  or 
pain,  sense-perception,  memory,  judgment,  desire,  or 
will.  Viewed  a  priori  the  two  ideas  seem  to  be  of  an 
entirely  different  order,  extended  matter  and  thought. 
Experience  furnishes  no  example  of  mental  affection 
produced  by  bodily  action.  They  hint,  indeed,  and 
would  like  to  tell  us  that  thought  may  have  existed  in 
the  atoms  from  the  very  first,  if  not  actually,  at  least 
potentially.  And  then,  in  carrying  out  their  theory, 
they  are  obliged  to  admit  that  for  millions  of  millions 
of  years  this  thought,  all  along  in  the  atom,  did  not 
come  forth  in  any  actual  thinking.  We  could  believe 
all  this  if  we  had  evidence ;  but  even  then  we  would 
insist  that  when,  at  the  end  of  these  countless  years, 
thought  came  into  exercise,  it  must  be  by  some  power 
calling  it  forth,  and  this  power  must  itself  be  a  think- 
ing power. 

But  then  it  is  said  that  by  this  theory  we  are 
merely  exalting  matter,  and  not  degrading  mind.  Dr. 
Tyndall  tells  us  that  he  remembers  the  time  when 
"  I  regarded  my  body  as  a  weed."  There  has  been 
a  terrible  reaction  of  opinion  since  that  time.     It  is 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  39 

possible  that  the  one  extreme  may  be  as  far  from  the 
truth  as  the  other.  The  Scriptures  represent  the 
body  and  soul  as  the  two  essential  constituents  of 
man's  compound  nature.  They  would  have  us  cherish 
both,  and  believe  that  the  two  are  to  be  reunited  at 
the  resurrection.  It  is  admitted  that,  in  the  ordinary 
state  of  matter,  —  the  state  of  air,  water,  metal,  earth, 
bone,  muscle,  skull,  —  it  has  no  capacity  of  thought  or 
feeling.  But  then  it  is  supposed  that  in  some  refined 
form  —  say  as  nervous  structure  —  it  may  rise  to  in- 
telligence and  feeling.  He  has,  however,  to  allow 
in  his  Appendix,  "  Granted  that  a  definite  thought 
and  a  definite  molecular  action  in  the  brain  occur 
simultaneously,  we  do  not  possess  the  intellectual 
organ,  nor  apparently  any  rudiment  of  the  organ, 
which  would  enable  us  to  pass  by  a  process  of  reason- 
ing from  the  one  to  the  other."  He  speaks  of  the 
chasm  between  the  two  classes  of  phenomena  being 
"  intellectually  impassable."  If  this  be  so,  the  attempt 
to  resolve  mind  into  matter  has  no  plausibility  what- 
ever. 

When  we  press  the  school  with  the  first  truths  of 
Aristotle,  the  intuitive  principles  of  Reid,  and  Kant's 
forms  of  sense,  understanding,  and  reason,  they  fall 
back  on  Herbert  Spencer's  boasted  resolution  of  them. 
David  Hume  and  J.  S.  Mill  accounted  for  these  — 
that  is,  for  our  belief  in  such  truths  as  mathemat- 
ical axioms,  the  existence  and  identity  of  self,  and 
the  universality  of  cause  and  effect  —  by  association 
of  ideas.  As  the  author  of  this  work  has  labored  hard 
to  disprove  this  theory,  he  is  glad  to  find  it  abandoned 


4<D  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

as  utterly  unfit  to  explain  the  nature  of  truths  claim- 
ing the  necessary  consent  of  all  men.  Herbert 
Spencer  defends  a  universal  postulate,  that  we  must 
assume  a  proposition  of  which  we  cannot  conceive 
or  think  the  opposite.  ("  Principles  of  Psychology," 
Chap.  XL)*  Using  this  as  a  test  or  criterion,  he  has  a 
whole  host  of  apriori  truths  which  he  does  not  attempt 
to  enumerate  or  to  classify,  as  mathematical  axioms 
and  arithmetical  propositions,  an  objective  existence 
external  to  consciousness,  and  an  Unknown  Reality 
hidden  under  all  the  shapes  that  present  themselves. 
Indeed,  he  is  threatening,  to  the  astonishment  and  dis- 
may of  scientists,  to  find  an  a  priori  demonstration  of 
physical  laws  which  are  usually  supposed  to  have 
been  discovered  by  induction.!  Mr.  Mill  accounted 
for  these  by  associations  formed  in  the  experience  of 
the  individual ;  but  Mr.  Spencer  is  lauded  because  he 
has  constructed  a  much  more  comprehensive  theory. 
He  calls  in  the  experience  of  the  race,  including  all 
our  animal  forefathers,  from  the  ascidians  downwards. 
"  Instead    of   relatively   feeble    nervous    associations 

*  Following  Hamilton,  who  follows  Kant  and  Leibnitz,  he  makes 
the  primary  mark  of  first  truths  to  be  Necessity.  I  have  endeavored 
to  show  that  it  is  Self-Evidence.  We  look  on  things  and  the  relation 
of  things,  and  discover  them  to  be  so  and  so.  As  we  do  so,  we  can- 
not be  made  to  think  the  opposite  ;  and  this  becomes  the  secondary 
test,  which  is  Necessity.  As  all  men  perceive  in  the  same  way,  we 
have  a  third  criterion,  Universality  This  makes  ultimate  truth  to 
consist,  not  in  the  associations  of  the  individual  (with  Mill),  or  of  the 
race  (with  Spencer),  or  of  necessity  of  conviction  (with  Leibnitz,  Kant, 
and  Hamilton),  but  in  the  perception  of  objects. 

t  An  able  writer,  in  the  "  British  Quarterly,"  is  greatly  perplexing 
him  in  regard  to  this  point. 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  4 1 

cLused  by  repetition  in  one  generation,  we  have 
organized  nervous  connections  caused  by  habit  in 
thousands  of  generations,  —  nay  probably  millions  of 
generations.  Space  relations  have  been  the  same,  not 
only  for  all  ancestral  men,  all  ancestral  primates,  all 
ancestral  orders  of  mammalia,  but  for  all  simple  orders 
of  creatures.  These  constant  space  relations  are 
expressed  in  definite  nervous  structures,  congenitally 
framed  to  act  in  definite  ways,  and  incapable  of  acting 
in  any  other  ways.  Hence  the  inconceivableness  of 
the  negation  of  a  mathematical  axiom,  resulting  as  it 
does  from  the  impossibility  of  inverting  the  actions 
of  the  correlative  nervous  structures,  really  stands  for 
the  infinity  of  experiences  that  have  developed  these 
structures."  ("  Psychology,"  Chap.  XI.)  I  venture  to 
predict  that  the  boasted  discovery  of  Spencer  will 
not  run  so  long  a  career  as  the  association  theory  of 
Hume  and  Mill  ;  and  that  it  will  be  seen  in  the  end 
to  be  as  incapable  of  accounting  for  the  phenomenon 
of  all  men  perceiving  certain  truths  intuitively,  and 
being  incapable  of  thinking  the  opposite. 

For,  observe  that  the  accumulation  of  the  experiences 
of  the  individual  in  Mr.  Mill's  theory  is  mental  through- 
out, and  is  in  a  sense  intelligent,  aided  by  associations 
in  consciousness.  Mr.  Spencer's  experiences  consist 
in  the  formation  of  "definite  nervous  structures." 
How  consciousness  and  intelligence  ever  get  into 
these  structures  he  does  not  tell  us,  and  does  not  pro- 
fess to  tell  us.  But  "  hence  the  inconceivableness  of 
the  negation  of  a  mathematical  axiom."  This  is  a 
fair  specimen  of  his  agility   in  leaping   over  lacunae 


42  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

in  reasoning  without  his  calling  our  attention  to  them, 
or  even,  so  far  as  we  can  judge,  seeing  them  himself. 
What  a  gap  between  a  nervous  structure  and  the  in- 
conceivableness  of  a  falsehood !  I  believe  Mr.  Spencer 
would  allow  that  the  connection  is  unthinkable.  Yet 
it  is  by  means  of  these  unthinkable  bands  that  he 
builds  his  theory. 

I  admit  the  existence  of  hereditary  tendencies. 
They  are  very  much  the  result  of  bodily  organization  ; 
such  as  the  aptitude  of  dogs  to  point  to  game  or  assist 
the  shepherd  in  guarding  his  flock,  or  the  disposition 
in  men  and  women  towards  certain  movements  and 
appetites.  They  are  produced  originally  by  circum- 
stances, are  continued  by  habit,  and  fashion  the  brain 
structure,  which  may  become  hereditary.  But  these 
surely  are  different  in  their  whole  nature  from  those 
fundamental  perceptions  and  convictions  which  are  in 
the  very  structure  of  our  minds,  which  gaze  immediately 
on  things  and  on  truth,  and  carry  with  them  their  own 
validity  ;  as  that  two  and  two  make  four,  that  every 
effect  has  a  cause,  and  that  there  is  an  essential  dis- 
tinction between  good  and  evil.  These  are  in  all  men, 
and  in  no  brutes  :  can  any  one  bring  himself  to 
believe  that  they  are  in  the  primates,  or  the  ancestral 
orders  of  mammalia,  —  not  to  go  back  to  the  ascidians  ? 
In  a  nascent  state  they  are  in  infants  and  savages,  and 
come  forth  in  adults,  and  can  be  expressed  by  edu- 
cated minds  ;  but  cannot  be  developed  in  the  souls  of 
lower  creatures.  They  look  at  truth  self-evident,  and 
carry  with  them  a  necessity  of  conviction.  I  should 
like  to  dwell  on  this  topic,  as  it  is  the  ground  on  which 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  43 

the  whole  school  fall  back.  An  insecure  ground  it  is  at 
best ;  and  is  known,  acknowledged,  and  felt  to  be  so, 
—  the  ultimate  foundation  of  truth  is  not  things  per- 
ceived, but  an  aggregation  of  human  experiences  flow- 
ing from  and  determined  by  a  succession  of  anterior, 
unintelligent,  animal  experiences.  But  I  have  said 
enough  to  counteract  the  assumption  of  Dr.  Tyndall, 
that  in  the  end  truth  rests  (the  word  is  a  mockery) 
on  the  flowing  stream  of  "  infinitely  numerous  expe- 
riences received  during  the  evolution  of  life."  Spencer 
has  confounded  two  things  which  ought  to  be  care- 
fully separated :  a  propensity  or  tendency  to  feel 
and  act  in  a  particular  way,  and  capable  of  becoming 
hereditary,  with  a  principle  of  reason  which  has  been 
in  man's  nature  from  the  beginning,  and  gazes  on  and 
guarantees  immutable  truth. 

A  personal  God.  This  is  the  result  of  the  separate 
truths  which  have  passed  before  us.  The  traces  of  ■■ 
intelligence,  of  purpose,  of  order,  of  harmony,  of  life, 
of  thought  in  man,  who  is  conscious  of  personality, 
all  carry  us  up  to  One  who  is  the  cause,  and  who 
must  himself  possess  the  qualities  which  he  has  pro- 
duced. 

Dr.  Tyndall  does  not  wish  to  be  called  an  atheist. 
In  commenting  on  a  resolution  passed  by  the  presby- 
tery of  Belfast,  he  declares  that  he  merely  ignores  the 
existence  of  their  God.  But  what  are  the  nature  and^ 
character  of  the  God  retained  by  him  ?  It  is  a  God 
unknown  and  unknowable,  as  Tyndall  expresses  it,  — 
"  a  power  absolutely  inscrutable  to  the  intelligence  of 
man."     In  this  style  of  remark  the  materialists  are  led 


44  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

by  Herbert  Spencer,  who  took  advantage  of,  and  fol- 
lowed out  to  their  consequences,  certain  rash  expres- 
sions employed  by  Sir  W.  Hamilton  and  Mansel,  — 
the  two  leading  philosophic  authorities  at  the  time 
when  this  modern  Titan  was  commencing  his  war 
against  the  gods  who  rule  in  Olympus.  Mr.  Spencer 
condescendingly  hands  over  this  unknown  land  to 
religion,  which,  however,  has  shown  no  inclination  to 
part  with  its  rich  inheritance  in  possession  for  a  title 
to  a  property  in  the  terra  incognita.  In  that  Book 
from  which  so  many  take  their  religion,  God  is  repre- 
sented as  so  far  unknown,  because  we  are  finite  and 
he  is  infinite,  but  also  so  far  known  because  we  are 
formed  in  his  image.  "  The  heavens  declare  the  glory 
of  God."  "  The  earth  is  full  of  his  praise."  Paul 
did  observe  in  Athens  an  altar  with  an  inscription  to 
the  unknown  God  ;  but  he  takes  advantage  of  this  to 
say,  "  Whom  therefore  ye  ignorantly  worship,  Him 
declare  I  unto  you."  And  he  declares  that  the  invisi- 
ble things  of  God  are  clearly  seen,  "  being  understood 
(voovjAeva,  the  strongest  word  the  Greek  language  can 
supply)  from  the  things  that  are  made,  even  his  eter- 
nal power  and  godhead."  The  inspired  writers  every- 
where encourage  us  to  seek  and  to  know  the  Lord. 
What  a  miserable  prospect,  to  be  obliged  to  look  out 
for  ever  on  this  impenetrable  darkness,  where  there 
may  indeed  be  a  power,  to  which,  however,  we  would 
feel  as  little  inclination  to  pray  as  to  a  cold  mountain 
or  the  hard  rock.  Surely  they  are  "  miserable  com- 
forters," who  have  nothing  to  say,  when  they  are 
brought,  as  they  often  must  be,  into  the  presence  of 


• 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  45 

the  widow,  the  fatherless,  the  motherless,  of  those 
suffering  from  incurable  disease,  the  despairing  and 
the  dying,  except "  There  is  a  mysterious  power  beyond 
the  visible ;  but  ye  need  not  look  to  it,  for  you  cannot 
know  whether  it  has  any  love  or  pity  for  you." 

I  make  no  inquiry  into  the  personal  belief  of  Dr. 
Tyndall.  But  I  am  entitled  to  examine  and  criticise 
the  statements  in  regard  to  God  which  he  has  so 
ostentatiously  made.  We  see  what  he  condemns  and 
rejects  ;  we  are  not  so  sure  about  what  he  believes. 
The  great  body  of  theists  think  that  they  have  proof 
of  the  existence  of  a  God  as  the  cause  of  nature,  above 
nature,  independent  of  nature,  which  He  has  created 
and  continues  to  preserve.  Our  author  evidently 
sets  aside  this  view.  He  is  not  willing  to  allow  us 
a  God  outside  of  nature.  He  is  obliged,  however,  to 
admit  a  "formative  power,  as  Fichte  would  call  it, 
this  structural  energy  ready  to  come  into  play  and 
build  the  ultimate  particles  of  matter  into  definite 
shapes  "  (Appendix).  This  might  seem  to  make  him, 
like  Fichte,  a  pantheist:  but  he  is  not  inclined  to 
become  fixed  down  to  any  religious  creed  ;  and,  so  far 
as  I  can  see,  retains  nothing  of  pantheism  but  its 
sentimentality,  to  which  so  many  are  clinging,  — wish- 
ing to  keep  alive  the  flower  after  they  have  cut  down 
the  tree  on  which  it  grew.  Whatever  this  God  may/ 
be,  he  must  be  material  if  all  things  can  be  derived 
from  matter.  But,  in  fact,  the  school  is  not  entitled 
to  say  any  thing  about  their  God,  for  he  is  and  must 
be  unknown. 

The  question  may  be  put,  and  is  put,  What  evi- 


( 


46  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 

dence  have  we  that  there  is  such  an  unknown  power  ? 
On  their  principles,  they  have  none.  They  tell  you 
that  there  is  a  necessary  conviction  which  requires  a 
belief  in  something  beyond  the  visible.  But  the  ques- 
tion arises,  May  not  this  necessary  belief  be  accounted 
for  in  the  way  in  which  Mr.  Spencer  accounts  for 
other  necessary  beliefs,  by  ascribing  it  to  an  heredi- 
tary feeling,  gendered  by  our  ever  coming  to  some- 
thing unknown  ?  Whatever  the  fathers  of  this  nescient 
philosophy  may  do,  from  some  remaining  hereditary 
feeling  handed  down  from  the  superstitious  age  of 
their  ancestors,  and  not  yet  obliterated,  the  children 
trained  by  them  are  marching  on  in  the  road  which 
has  been  opened  to  them,  and  affirming  that  we  have 
no  reason  whatever  for  believing  in  this  unknown 
region,  except  a  subjective  feeling  which  we  can  ac- 
count for,  and  which  will  disappear  in  a  few  genera- 
tions. This  young  race  of  thinkers  will  farther  tell 
you,  and  others  will  agree  with  them,  that  this  un- 
knowable God  is  not  worth  contending  for. 

In  order  to  furnish  some  sort  of  satisfaction  to 
themselves  when  they  feel  how  little  they  have  left, 
and  not  to  scare  others  by  the  emptiness  and  loneli- 
ness of  the  prospect,  materialists  are  ever  falling  back 
on  some  unknown  power.  But  if  they  know  it  to  be 
a  power }  they  know  something  of  it :  it  is  not  absolutely 
"  inscrutable."  "We"  ask  them  how  they  know  it  to  be 
power,  and  we  show  them  that  on  the  same  grounds 
we  may  know  it  to  be  something  more,  —  to  be  vas'Jy 
more,  to  be  also  intelligence,  wisdom,  and  goodness. 
Every  one  who  has  thought  on  the  subject  perceives 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  47 

how  large  a  portion  of  our  knowledge  is  obtained  by 
the  use  of  the  principle  of  cause  and  effect.  It  is  a 
favorite  maxim  of  Aristotle  that  we  can,  properly 
speaking,  be  said  to  know  things  only  when  we  know 
their  causes.  How  do  we  reach  such  a  common  truth 
as  that  the  persons  walking  past  us  on  the  street 
are  beings  possessed  of  intelligence  and  feeling  ?  It 
is  evident,  on  the  one  hand,  that  we  do  not  by  the 
senses  perceive  their  souls  as  we  perceive  their  bodies  ; 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  that  we  are  not  immediately 
conscious  of  their  souls  as  we  are  of  our  own.  We 
are  certain  that  we  are  surrounded  by  intelligent  men 
and  women,  because  we  see  effects  which  we  know 
from  our  own  experience  imply  an  intelligent  cause. 
It  is  on  a  like  principle  that  we  argue  from  the  visible 
effects  in  the  world  that  there  is  a  power  beyond,  — 
a  power  so  far  known.  But  by  a  like  process,  that  is 
by  the  argument  from  effect,  we  argue  that  there  must  ^ 
be  a  benevolence  beyond,  to  account  for  the  benevo- 
lence we  see  in  nature. 

Prof.  Tyndall  tells  us,  in  a  passage  of  his  first 
Preface,  in  which  he  seems  to  express  genuine  feel- 
ing :  "  I  have  noticed,  during  years  of  self-observation, 
that  it  is  not  in  hours  of  clearness  and  vigor  that  this 
doctrine  (that  of  material  atheism)  commends  itself 
to  my  mind  ;  that  in  the  presence  of  stronger  and 
healthier  thought  it  ever  dissolves  and  disappears,  as 
offering  no  solution  of  the  mystery  in  which  we  dwell 
and  of  which  we  form  a  part."  Upon  this  I  have  to 
remark  that  the  younger  pupils  trained  in  the  school 
are  beginning  to  say,  "  We  need  no  solution  except  the 


48  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 


solution  of  hereditary  experience  ;  "  and  some  of  them 
will  add,  "  We  do  not  wish  to  be  troubled  in  our  em- 
ployments and  pleasures  by  any  solution  drawn  from 
a  world  of  which  we  have  no  evidence,  and  which  is 
at  best  a  world  of  darkness."  I  am  also  tempted  to 
say  that  we  doubt  whether  it  is  by  "  self-observa- 
tion "  of  feelings,  which  may  vary  from  day  to  day, 
and  from  hour  to  hour,  that  we  are  most  likely  to 
get  a  reasonable  and  settled  conviction.  I  venture 
farther  to  hint  that  the  theoretical  opinion  which 
Prof.  Tyndall  holds,  and  to  which  he  is  seeking  to 
proselytize  others,  may  be  fostering  these  hours  of 
"  weakness  and  doubt "  of  which  he  speaks,  and  hin- 
dering those  times  of  "  stronger  and  healthier  thought " 
which  would  lead  him  to  find  a  "  solution  of  the  mys- 
tery of  the  world  in  which  we  dwell,"  —  not  to  be  found, 
he  acknowledges,  in  a  material  atheism,  but  surely  to 
be  found  somewhere. 

He  believes  in  a  region  "  outside  of  science,"  and 
admits  "the  unquenchable  claims  of  the  emotional 
nature."  "Physical  science 'cannot  cover  all  the  de- 
mands of  man's  nature."  He  tells  us  in  the  Preface 
to  the  seventh  edition,  "  No  atheistic  reasoning  can,  I 
hold,  dislodge  religion  from  the  heart  of  man.  Logic 
cannot  deprive  us  of  life,  and  religion  is  life  to  the 
religious.  As  an  experience  of  consciousness,  it  is 
perfectly  beyond  the  assaults  of  logic."  But  is  there 
not  a  risk  of  this  blank  system  undermining  our 
grander  sentiments,  by  showing  that  this  region  out- 
side of  science  is  a  region  of  darkness  ?  Our  feelings, 
in  order  to  be  permanent,  and  that  they  may  not  be 


IDEAS  IN  NATURE.  49 

killed  by  the  malaria  of  "  weakness  and  of  doubt," 
must  be  founded  on  conviction,  and  on  a  conviction 
which  can  justify  itself.  He  who  removes  the  ground 
of  the  conviction  is  doing  as  much  as  within  him  lies 
to  undermine  and  scatter  the  emotions.  Nature  can 
raise  within  us  feelings  of  awe,  sublimity,  and  love, 
only  so  far  as  it  is  supposed  to  be  pervaded  by  intelli- 
gence and  goodness.  What  are  these  feelings,  what 
their  nature  and  origin,  that  we  cherish  them,  or 
allow  them  to  have  any  influence  over  us  ?  What 
is  this  religion  placed  in  the  heart  of  man  ?  Are 
they  simply  the  product  of  atoms  that  have  fortunately 
combined  in  a  certain  way  in  a  time  of  "  stronger  and 
healthier  thought,"  but  may  separate  in  an  immedi- 
ately succeeding  hour  of  "  weakness  and  of  doubt "  ? 
If  they  are  not,  then  we  have  here  something  which 
atoms  cannot  explain,  and  the  whole  theory  is  left 
in  ruins.  If  they  are,  then  the  feelings  will  be 
cherished  only  when  the  atoms  happen  to  meet  and 
form  them,  and  are  in  themselves  no  better  than  no 
feelings,  or  feelings  of  "  weakness  and  of  doubt." 
True,  the  tendencies  gendered  by  hereditary  training, 
or  by  the  spirit  prevailing  around,  may  continue  these 
nobler  feelings  for  a  time  after  the  conviction  and 
belief  have  gone  ;  but  it  will  be  only  for  a  time,  and 
they  will  ere  long  die  down  into  indifference,  —  just 
as  the  glow  of  the  evening  sky  fades  speedily  into 
darkness,  after  the  sun,  whose  beams  produced  it, 
sinks  beneath  the  horizon.  I  am  convinced  that  the 
tendency  of  this  empty  theory,  and  its  actual  in- 
fluence, so  far  as  it  is  adopted  by  the  rising  genera- 

3 


i 


50  IDEAS  IN  NATURE. 


tion,  is  to  uproot  those  grander  sentiments  of  awe 
and  of  love,  which  are  the  most  interesting,  enliven- 
insf,  and  influential  elements  in  our  moral  and  religious 
nature.  Will  reverence  and  confidence,  will  inspiring 
hope  and  fervent  affection,  continue  when  men  believe 
only  in  the  interaction  of  atoms  in  a  closed  globe  sur- 
rounded by  darkness  which  may  be  felt  ?  But  Prof. 
Tyndall  is  right  when  he  speaks  of  "  the  unquenchable 
claims  of  the  emotional  nature."  Our  natural  and 
spontaneous  feelings  will  be  found  stronger  in  the  end 
than  any  artificial  form  of  speculative  unbelief ;  and 
they  will  burst  forth  at  times  like  a  fountain,  in  spite 
of  all  the  efforts  to  repress  them.  But  they  have 
such  power  because  the  waters  are  deep  down  in  our 
nature  and  constitution,  and  fed  by  the  sky  above  and 
the  earth  around,  penetrated  by  heaven-descended 
influences. 


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